#that and maybe the Horrors putting me into an intensely distressed state that pushed me over the edge | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

getouswh0re · 3 years

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pairing: gojo satoru x reader

genre: yandere, unhealthy relationships, mentions of violence, blood & gore, mass murdering, obsession, slight manga spoilers

synopsis: he would tear the entire world apart with his own hands, just to keep you by his side evermore.

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Love is a lethal bliss.

Bearing semblance to momentary sweetness, it warms the cockles of your heart; yet before one could even savour it for long, in its honey-like aftertaste is a deadly poison — seeping through the branching veins and killing every cell of the living host within its reach. Soundlessly, life is sucked out as one discovers themselves teetering on a tightrope of death.

i) The ambience of the atmosphere between you and Gojo is silent, deadly — akin to the calming weather before a raging storm. As the two of you stand at opposite ends of the living room, eyes refusing to meet with the sorcerer’s as an expanse of sky blue smoulders holes into your soul. Feeling your limbs trembling from the intensity of his stare, cat got your tongue. The words you’ve meant to say are stuck at the back of your throat as the taller male shifts a step forward, and you unconsciously leaning back against the wall.

“Do we have to do this love?” You cringe at the feigned pain interlaced in your ex’s tone. “You know you don’t have to do this. This is painful for both you and I, and knowing how much you love me, you certainly don’t want to put both of us through all of this. Don’t you?”

You bite your lip, eyes downcast.

You wish all of this isn’t necessary, that everything that has happened is nothing more than your imagination regarding the red flags displayed before your periphery. Still, you have to do it having mulled over it for a while. It is about time that all of this come to an end.

Ever since a certain man called Gojo Satoru meandered into your life, everything changed as your feelings for the male blossomed, like fresh buds on the bare branches with remnants of snow thawing into tinges of spring. It didn’t take long for the two of you to reciprocate one another’s feelings, yet cracks gradually surface on what seemed like an all-too-perfect fairy tale, breaking the crystal ball of illusion that you had been trapped in throughout all these months.

For as long as you could remember, Gojo has been acting out of character; sure enough he retains his childish personality and insufferable god complex, yet there are times when you could barely recognise him. On occasions he would whine for hours, desperate to gain your attention, and there were moments when he’d follow wherever you went. Initially dismissing his clinginess as his way of displaying affection, you didn’t think much about it. That was until his demeanour underwent a 180 degree shift; being overbearing was one thing, yet the sorcerer had the audacity to dictate your life and your social circle, stepping his foot way past the boundaries that even you thought was too much.

It wasn’t like you didn’t give Gojo an opportunity to change for the better. You did; it was him who failed to reflect on his own mistakes, to take things for granted without realising he had been in the wrong all along. With those alarming signs of the relationship spiralling into a toxic one, it occurred to you that you should end things fast before circumstances aggravated.

Love is a beautiful pain.

To relish its fleeting vestiges between their fingertips, one must endure the torment of its thorns. Not everyone has the courage to sacrifice their sanity for something so transient, but one — or maybe few, who are more than willing to pay for their price, would do anything to hold onto such evanescent reminisces close to their heart.

ii) “Come on y/n. You know you don’t want to break up with me, stop lying to your heart.”

As if his saccharine smile isn’t enough to make bile surge up your throat, the lovelorn white-haired man stares at you with such adoration, making you revolted than ever; before you could even blink, he is already inches away, bringing up his slender fingers and caressing your cheeks with utter delicacy.

“From the moment we met, it’s like the red strings of fate intertwining, akin to two worlds colliding.”

Feeling his breath tickling your frigid neck, goosebumps laminate your skin as you shudder underneath his lasting touches.

“Your heart belongs to me, and mine yours. It’s like the universe wants the two of us to be together — forever. Just stop denying your feelings, okay? I can hear your heartbeat ... it’s beating crazy, just for me.”

“Gojo, you need to stop all of this —“

“Oh honey, don’t say that ... I know the look in those eyes.” He presses on, his insufferable ego refusing to give in. “You might be pushing me away, but your body does the exact opposite. You’re still in love with me. You care for me, I know you do.”

Perhaps that is what makes terrifying about the sorcerer. Wearing his usual smile on a deceptively charming face, his true thoughts are inscrutable beneath the unfazed facade; worst of all, you never know what would drive him off the edge, not until you experience triggering a ticking time bomb by accident.

“Gojo, hear me out.” You push the towering male away, determined than ever to cut ties with him for the sake of your own safety. “What you do is not love anymore. It’s ... obsession! And it’s suffocating me! If you truly cared about me you would’ve respected my wishes and opinions — but you didn’t. No matter how much you love someone, this is far beyond acceptable. I ... we need to break up, for the sake of both of us.”

Stunned, the remnants of hope flicker in the sorcerer’s azure eyes before dissipating into darkness, along with his despondent heart that has plummeted into abysmal depths of a bottomless void. Hands retracting from your skin, you heave out a sigh of relief when spine-chilling chortles echo from Gojo’s throat.

“You think that’s it? That I’ll let you go?” The crazed glint in his burning stare convinces you even more that breaking up with this delusional man is the only option to save yourself. Slowly backing towards the door, you have prepared yourself for the worst, making a potential run with a bag filled with your valuables.

“You cannot run away from me y/n! You know you can never escape from me. I will flip the world upside down to find you — and hunt you down! Want me to prove that? I will tear the entire world apart by my hands, just so that you won’t run away from me anymore!”

You finally make your run, sprinting out of your shared apartment as fast as you could whilst ignoring his shrilling screams, deciding to leave everything behind for good.

Love is an unprecedented enigma.

Like a never-ending Möbius strip, the red strings of fate intertwines people's fates — yet at the same time, it looms over everyone's lives like a doom of death, mercilessly tearing loved ones or those held dear to their hearts apart within the blink of an eye. Callous as it seems, it reminds people how minuscule acts of gratitude allow them to appreciate the present before they lament or carry their regrets later on in life. Unfortunately, with the complexity of destiny, nobody could ever foresee when karma would dawn upon their heads. Not even you.

Little would you know that doomsday would be awaiting you so soon.

iii) For what feels like going through hell and back, you finally manage to rid yourself out of the psychotic sorcerer's hands and his devious manipulation. For what it’s worth, there is no guarantee about your life returning to normal. Knowing that it is nearly impossible to escape from Gojo (knowing that his sixth eyes can instantly locate where you are), you eventually make the decision of moving away with a heavy heart, considering that it would be what it’s best to solve your issues with your controlling ex.

Having settled the documents and errands, all that’s left is for you to leave the place filled with nothing other than sad memories. As if it seems like a fresh start is extending its outstretched hands towards you, freedom is just within hand’s reach.

Not until all hell breaks loose on October 31st — the day of your departure.

Copper tinges beckon indigo skies at twilight, remnants of the setting sun shining through the windows as you take a last, rueful look at the apartment you’ve resided most of your life before grabbing your belongings and heading towards the train station. With the day being Halloween, it isn’t surprising at all that the streets would be crowded, flooded with jovial citizens who want to enjoy themselves during the spooky season. All you have to do is make your way onto the designated train.

Yet that never happened, because havoc descends among the living like a catastrophic plague.

Just as you writhe your way through the streets and making your way towards the train station, screams erupt when a massive quake demolish the surrounding buildings into shambles, tearing the festive merriment in the atmosphere apart as people turn and run in all directions without warning — leaving you extremely perplexed about the current state of Shibuya. Horror is evident in every onlooker’s eyes whilst they dash for shelter; the city is in absolute chaos — danger looming, asphalt pavements ensanguined with blood, distressed cries resonating into the night.

“Hey!” You call out, grabbing onto a random passerby. “What the hell happened?”

“Danger ... curses ... sorcerer —“

Your blood run cold upon the mentioning, and it didn’t take long for you to figure out the entire situation and who has been responsible. In hindsight, you should’ve had followed the rest and ran away from the scene immediately, but you don’t — standing there amongst the quiet streets in utter terror. And before you could even lift your legs and sprint for your life, there he is, stained from head to toe in blood — an inebriated stare full of nothing but infatuation for you.

“Honey! There you are ...” Skipping over mountains of corpses humming a joyful tune, Gojo happily pulls you into his chest, nestling his face against your squirming shoulders, his grip a vice against your futile efforts of struggling to break free. “I was so worried about you ever since you left! I ... I feel like my world is falling apart, and I just cannot live without you you know!”

“Get. The. Hell. Off. Me!”

The sorcerer chortles at your demand, ignoring your protests as he hugs you closer to his throbbing heart.

“Darling ... we could’ve been so happy together. Yet you have to do all of this. For what? If you had given me your heart and soul, none of this would’ve happened —“

“Oh, so this is my fucking problem now?” You hiss, shoving the taller male off. “You really are crazy — Gojo Satoru. But I never regret the decision I’ve made, and I will do it again and again if I need to!”

That is when he activates his domain expansion.

All of your sudden, your mind is a blank — staring into the sorcerer’s cerulean eyes as it overwhelms you like a raging hurricane, sucking you deeper and deeper until your entirety sinks into his infinite void. For once you finally fear the strongest man on earth — of the dangers he possesses and what would’ve happened had he decided to break your mind the hard way.

“To be honest, I don’t care ~” Silent tears roll down your cheeks once you recognise the drop in the man’s usual carefree tone, feeling the remnants of sanity being ruthlessly stripped away from you as you fall limp in Gojo’s loving arms.

“The seas can rage, the heavens will rumble. But no matter what happens, I’m never going to let any of this take you away from me — for you and I are the honoured ones, destined to be together ...”

With his voice dwindling to a hushed whisper, the sorcerer slips a shimmering ring onto your finger, declaring in utmost adoration his vows of undying love.

“In time and evermore.”

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jaceyneedsabetterusername · 3 years

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Gin and Paleta

Pairing: Javier Pena x Reader

Summary: When a storm knocks out the power, you ask Javier to spend the night with you to ease your fear of the dark. A few drinks later, you admit more than you ever meant to.

Warnings: Drunk and emotional reader, a wee bit of angst at one part, anxiety because of the dark, Javier teasing you, mentions of prostitution

Word Count: 5400

A/N: This is my first time writing for Javier and I’m a little nervous about it. Hopefully it’s alright!

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The wind outside howled with an intensity that you hadn’t experienced in a long time. You clutched your hot tea to your chest, allowing it to warm you in the nice cool Bogota night as you watched the rain fall hard and heavy outside your window. Every now and again there was a flash of lightning that crackled across the sky that was followed by a loud rumble. The storm was right over you and the lightning had gotten closer and closer to the apartments the embassy had put you up in when you moved to Columbia.

It really was quite beautiful, this storm that raged across the city. It had been hot and muggy for days leading up to the storm but now the angry gray clouds that blocked out the stars and the pounding rain brought a blanket of coolness to offer refuge from the constant Columbian summer heat. Your favorite scented candle burned on the table, the smell mixing perfectly with the scent of wet earth, asphalt, and trees overtaking your apartment through the small crack in the window you’d left for exactly that purpose. The TV played mindlessly in the background to create further ambience.

Suddenly, there was a loud flash just outside your apartments that lit up the entire street, sparks flying everywhere out your window. You yelped in shock as the power surged and then cut out completely, leaving you in total darkness aside from the flame of your candle. At the same time, there was a deafening rumble and the whole apartment shook with thunder.

Your heart raced and you panted as you walked towards the window to see that the power was across the next few blocks. There was a downed wire in the next street down that still sparked occasionally in the rain. Car alarms went off in the street. Lightning must have struck the wires.

Then the darkness crept in. When you turned to face your apartment, the utter darkness and silence of every corner began to feel suffocating. You reached over to the table and held the candle up as your breathing struggled to stay level. On shaky legs, you made your way over to a set of drawers that held various boxes of matches and a few old lighters before searching the house for every candle and flashlight you could find. After about ten minutes, you had set up candles all across the main room of your apartment but it still wasn’t much light. Small halos of warm yellow light illuminated only a few feet in diameter around each small flame.

For the final, and perhaps most paranoid move of all, you reached to grab your gun but stopped, fingers flexing and clenching into your palm as you tried to calm yourself down. “It’s just the dark,” you told yourself, breathing deeply, “Just the same things that are here in the day time. Stop being ridiculous.”

It was irrational to have your gun on you. What was gonna happen? The boogeyman was going to jump out of your closet and eat you? Maybe Escobar’s men would come and pick you, Steve, and Javier off now that it was dark. They did know where you all lived and they had already shown they had no problem flexing that fact when they killed Steve’s cat. That also was irrational and you knew it. They had better things to do and plot a whole assassination on three Americans during a power outage when God knows they had many other more menacing enemies.

And even so, every little creak from the storm that had previously been endearing now became footsteps of intruders or monsters. Here you were, someone literally trained to take down drug lords, who had been in their fair share of gun fights and seen first hand the horrors that men can do to one another, cowered in the couch trying to stave off a full blown panic attack as you sat alone in the dark.

Maybe you could hang out with Steve and Connie for the night, at least until the power returned, you considered. No… they had Olivia now and you were sure they had their hands full without worrying about a whole grown ass woman who was just scared of the dark. You weren’t close with anyone else in the building except for Javier but that idea made you cringe. He would just make fun of you and you knew it. You already knew how dumb it sounded to be an adult who was scared of the dark. You really needed to just grow up and get over it. That was exactly what you’d resolved to do.

Twenty minutes passed before you gave in. Twenty minutes full of startled gasps when the wind blew some leaves off the tree and into your window, the car alarms were silenced, or the wood floors creaked beneath your feet. Against your initial judgement, you pressed yourself off the couch, scooped up the candle that you’d had placed on the table and made your way downstairs to Javier’s apartment.

You rubbed your arm nervously while you waited for him to answer the knocks, already foretelling all the shit he was about to give you. He opened the door and you noticed the single flashlight in his hand that seemed to be the only light in his entire abode. “Y/N, you alright?” He asked, noticing right away the way you kept peeking over your shoulder with an anxiety that radiated off of you.

You nodded, “Uh, yeah. Your power’s out too?” The question was stupid and obvious and you both knew that. No shit the power was out. There wasn’t a single light on in the entire building.

“Yeah.” He answered simply but there was little intonation in his voice that was certainly mocking you in his typical lowkey asshole way. He leaned against the doorway coolly and if you hadn’t been freaking out so badly, you would have stopped to admire. Maybe it was best that everything but his general outline was concealed in darkness. You’d been pushing down a crush on your friend and partner for months now, knowing it was unprofessional and knowing that he would probably never think of you the same way even if it wasn’t unprofessional. Coming to him like this made you feel like a damsel in distress and you weren’t sure if you liked that analogy, especially considering that you were convinced nothing would ever come of it.

You rocked back and forth on your heels, “I was wondering if, um, maybe you’d be willing to hang out with me until the power comes back on?”

A small smirk appeared on his face with a quirked eyebrow, “Are you scared of the dark, L/N?” He asked, using your last name as if to exaggerate the humor in the fact that a DEA agent who’s been shot at before is scared of something as little as the dark, “How old are you? Eight?”

You rolled your eyes, cheeks burning red but playing it off with a chuckle. “Shut up,” you whined, “Look, I know it sounds stupid but I can offer beer or gin and a few paleta that I need to eat before they melt now.”

Javier looked you up and down in the low glow of the candle that was held between your hands, almost as if you were using it to keep your hands warm. He couldn’t help the little endearing smile that crept on his lips. In all honesty, he didn’t care much that you were afraid of the dark. He just loved to see the way you got flustered when he made fun of you. His jokes were never meant maliciously, especially when directed towards you, and he was glad you could take the jabs and even throw them back. It was one of the things that made him crazy about you.

After a moment, he nodded, “Yeah, I can come hang out for a few. Just let me grab my keys.” He disappeared back into his apartment, flashlight illuminating his couch and table as he grabbed his keys from the kitchen counter. Soon, he was following you down the hall and up the stairs to your apartment.

You hadn’t even locked the door in your hurried state to get down to Javier but you knew it wasn’t going to be a long trip. He noticed the various candles burning around your apartment, lowly illuminating the small space.

“Beer or gin? I got water too if you want that though.” You offered, making your way to the kitchen to hold up your end of the bargain.

“Uh, gin, please.” He walked in and made himself at home like he practically lived there. He had come over often to go over files sometimes over drinks and food late into the night. He was comfortable in your space and you were in his, with the exception of that hyperawareness of your every move when you’re around the person you like. There was a slightly electric feeling in the air for both of you but neither of you knew that the other felt it too.

You brought two glasses of gin, probably a little fuller than they should have been, in and handed one to Javier and one for yourself. The pair of you sat on your tan sofa and you quickly inspected the packaged popsicles in your hand, “I have cajeta and chamoy.”

“Don’t really care.” He shrugged, “sipping” his gin. You looked between the two and picked your favorite, giving him the other one.

Two hours later, the pair of you were two paleta and three-quarters of a bottle of gin down (most of which you had drunk) and things had gotten personal. Topics had bounced from work stuff, to you teasing him about his well-known rendezvous with his informants, to childhood pets, and more. A silence had settled over the pair of you. Neither of you knew how late it was anymore, just that it was silent out save for the rain and the occasional gunshot. It had become evident early on that Javier held his alcohol better than you did but even he was slipping after this many glasses of hard liquor.

“Do you ever get tired of being alone?” You asked out of the blue, staring up at the ceiling.

Javier looked over at you, the way you tapped your nail against the side of the glass with too much focus. He couldn’t tell if you were trying to avoid his gaze after the question or if you really were just that interested in the sound it made in your drunken state. Your partner just shrugged though and deflected the question, “Get a dog or something.”

Your face twisted in an over exaggerated look of thought. “I thought about it but it makes me sad to-,” you hiccuped, “to think about a puppy being stuck inside all day while we’re out chasing Escobar. No yard or anything for them to run around in.”

Javier nodded in understanding, “Guess you’re right. Wouldn’t be a good life at all.”

“See, though, Javi,” You pointed sloppily at him with a lifted finger from your fifth - no sixth - glass of gin, “You and I both know that’s not what I’m asking. But who am I kidding? You’ve always got all those little informants of yours hanging around. You’re probably not too lonely.”

Your partner sighed, used to Steve giving him crap about it but you didn’t usually say much about it. “Yeah, well we all have ways of dealing with the loneliness.” Seeing the prostitutes in town wasn’t his proudest repeat offense and, if he was being honest with himself, he didn’t just see them for the information they had on Escobar. Even for people who had commitment issues, like himself, being alone got really damn hard sometimes.

“It’s so unfair that they don’t have male prostitutes like they have women. What about all the lonely and frustrated women of Bogota?” You complained, taking a sip to punctuate your sentence.

Javier couldn’t help but laugh a little, “You’re telling me you’d really go see a prostitute if there were men out there that did it?” Yeah, right, he thought.

You shook your head and sighed in defeat, “No… I don’t think I would. I think I actually want someone to love, y’know?” You laughed at your own clicheness, “What about you, Javi? I know you have all your lady friends but have you ever loved someone?”

If perhaps you’d been sober, maybe you would have noticed the way he sucked a guilty breath in and backstepped, maybe even might have apologized for prying into his personal life. In your drunk state, though, you had no qualms with your personal questions.

“I, uh, I did. Once.”

“Yeah? What happened?”

He scratched his nose and hesitated. Another one of his less proud moments that he didn’t like to share. The only person he’d told that wasn’t family or a friend from back in Texas was Steve. Nevertheless, he swallowed hard and continued, the drinks even making him loose at this point, “We were supposed to get married but…”

“But?” You pressed, the intoxication making you obnoxiously impatient.

He gave you a vaguely testing look before continuing, “But I never made it to the wedding.”

You gasped, leaning forward and setting your drink on the table, “You left her at the altar?!”

Javier flinched back at your sudden lurch towards him and looked at you with a slightly annoyed expression, “I know it was a shitty thing to do!” While he didn’t appreciate the judgement because he already felt shitty enough about the whole incident, he knew it was more the gin than you to blame for your outburst. He leaned forward and pulled your half-full glass of gin back towards him, not to drink for himself, just to get out of your grasp. “What about you? You ever been in love?”

You bit your lip, “I don’t know. I’ve never really been in love before but there’s this one guy that I know that I think I could be pretty close to it.”

Javier’s chest tightened at the thought of you loving another man. He knew he had no right to your heart but that didn’t stop the pang of jealousy at the thought. Part of him wanted to pry further, just so he could know you were safe (or maybe to fuel some twisted personal hatred for the man he didn’t know). In typical angsty Javier fashion, though, he opted for the aloof, detached, and slightly annoyed response, “Then why are you complaining about being so lonely? Sounds like you have someone.”

You pulled your knees into your chest and threw the blanket that was draped over the couch over your now balled up form. You shrugged, glancing up at Javier with a look he might have noticed was longing if he hadn’t been looking anywhere but at you. “I don’t think he likes me the way I like him. I think maybe that’s why it feels so lonely. Knowing you could have someone but still being alone.”

“If you could have him then get him.” Javier Pena, always the blunt one, especially when his own feelings were in the mix.

You shook your head, “It’s not that simple.”

Suddenly, Javier got a little nervous at your tone, “He better not be one of Escobar’s fucking men.” The thought of you loving someone else made him jealous and angry but the thought of you loving a sicario made him lividly angry. There was no way you could possibly love a monster like that but it didn’t stop the thought from crossing his mind.

Your mouth dropped in offense, “Fuck, Javi, is that how low you think of me?” Your moods had been swinging all night thanks to the gin but you were pretty sure you still would have found the very suggestion just as offensive if you’d been sober.

“What- wait - no. That’s not what I think of you, I ju-”

“Well, clearly it is or you wouldn’t have suggested it.” You stood up off the couch, stepping away angrily but tripping over the low coffee table in the dark. Your slowed reflexes weren’t enough to catch you and crashed to the floor, “Shit…” You groaned, rolling over and trying to push yourself up to a sitting position. Your hair hung messily over your face when you looked down at where your hand met the floor.

Javier jumped up and clumsily made his way to your side, “Shit, Y/N, you alright?” He knelt down and placed a hand on your arm, offering his other one to help you stand. Sparks flew where his skin met yours but you convinced yourself that you were just feeling because of the alcohol.

You waved him off drunkenly and swiped your hair clumsily out of your face. Instead of sitting up, you leaned back and looked up at him, tears welling up in your eyes for who the hell knows why. Were you angry or offended or desperate or just a drunk mess? You couldn’t tell anymore but you weren’t used to losing your emotions like this and Javier wasn’t used to seeing it either. He halted, uncomfortable at the way your eyes shone in the candlelight with your tears.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have even suggested that you’d be in love with a sicario. I really don’t think you’d do anything like that.” Javier apologized, a rare occurrence for the man but, gosh, would he say anything if it meant that your tears would dry. Drunk or not, he couldn’t stand knowing that made you cry.

You sniffled, wiping a crocodile tear from your cheek, “Why the hell do we even sit here and make ourselves sad, Javi? Y’know? I mean I sit here every night and pine over a guy who I’ve convinced myself won’t love me. Isn’t that stupid? I convinced myself! How the hell would I even know? So instead of womaning up and actually finding out the truth, I just resign to the thought that there’s no way he could love me. Isn’t that pathetic? I should just learn to be like you. Confident. Women don’t say no to you because… well how could they?”

Javier shook his head and looked down, “No,” He admitted quietly, “It’s not pathetic. It’s different when you’re talking about love versus lust. I pay for twenty minutes with a poor girl who has to do it to survive. If anything, that’s what’s pathetic. Honestly, I’m scared shitless when it comes to love.”

He thought about your words and how much sense they actually made. The reason he hadn’t told you about his feelings for you were partly because he thought you’d never feel the same way. He was convinced that his reputation as a womanizer asshole, that he had rightly earned prior to you moving to Bogota, had turned you off entirely. Besides, wouldn’t he just mess it up? He thought he loved Lorraine but look how that turned out. The logical reason he told himself was the relationships amongst partners would be frowned upon but he knew that was a lie. Since when did Javier Pena follow the rules? The only thing holding him back really truly was himself. So why did it feel so impossible to come clean?

Javier shook the thought from his head. You were drunk and rambling. Even if he were to man up and confess his love for you, this was not the time to do it. He’d be surprised if you remembered anything in the morning. Besides, you were on about some man you loved and he could only imagine who it was. He’d seen your gaze linger a little longer on Carillo than was usual for a colleague. Perhaps that was who it was, the mystery man that you couldn’t have. He was married, after all. It would be a logical road block.

Part of Javier wanted to probe your brain and know the truth. He couldn’t tell if it was something that would make himself feel better or worse. It would put him out of his misery. Maybe if he heard it straight from your mouth that you didn’t love him, he could finally get over you. It would take a while, certainly many drunken nights and a few visits to Freckles, but he could do it. But if he did know, he also knew himself well enough to know he’d harbor some silent resentment for whoever the man was for taking the girl he loved.

He shook his head at his thoughts when he saw the way you swayed a little, as if rocking on a boat despite being on solid ground, your eyes drifting shut while you struggled to stay sitting upright. You weren’t in your right state of mind and to ask you such a personal question would be a total breach of trust and respect. He’d be furious if he found out anybody else had done the same to you.

“C’mon, let’s get you in bed.” Javier swallowed hard before shifting to help pull you up by your arm.

Your body flopped loosely to your feet and you whined, “Noooo! We were just talking! Besides, you’re just gonna leave me in the dark and go back home.” You pouted, head lulling against his as the full blown weight of the alcohol hit you. Any composure you’d managed to maintain, which admittedly was very little, melted away into Javier’s chest as he hoisted you up and carried you bridal style to your bedroom.

He glanced down at your made up bed and laid down your body as gently as he could, though you did roll on your own accord more clumsily than he had hoped. Javier flinched when your hands shot up to grab his shoulders, “Javi! Don’t leave me! It’s dark and scary still.”

He sighed, his hands settling on his hips once he managed to pry your hands off his shoulders, “Just let me grab you some water and you’ll be fine.”

“What if I wake up in the middle of the night and it’s still completely dark!”

“I have a feeling you won’t be waking up for a while, hermosa.” He chuckled at the way your face was already half smashed into the pillow, your hair was laying over your cheek, and your eyes were closed shut, surely already halfway asleep.

You reached up blindly for whatever you could grab, your fingers sliding down his forearm before they managed to hook onto a few of his fingers, “Please, Javi. I gave you popsicles and alcohol! The least you could do is stay the night and keep me company.”

Javier reached down and pulled the blanket that was folded at the end of your bed over your body. “I’ll be right back.” With that he left your room, feeling his way to the kitchen to get you a glass of ice water before returning to find you curled up in the blanket with your eyes closed. A small smile grew on his face, astounded by how you could still be so beautiful even when you looked like such a mess. A few strands of hair had fallen over your face and Javier reached down to gently brush them away from your mouth and behind your ear.

You shifted a little, “You can sleep here.” Your hand stretched out to feel the other half of your queen sized bed.

Finally, Javier decided to give in. “No, I’ll just make up a bed on the couch.”

“There’s plenty o’ bed to share!” You giggled, thinking what you said was way funnier than it really was.

Javier shook his head, “You're drunk, Y/N. I don’t want you waking up in the morning to see me in your bed and you go getting the wrong idea.”

“You have no idea how many times I’ve wanted to wake up to see you in my bed.” You snuggled further into the pillow, your words barely above a murmur.

“What?” Javier’s whole body seized up and he couldn’t look anywhere but you. He shook the thought away. There was no way you meant that. It was the gin and nothing more. He couldn’t get his hopes up, “Nevermind. You just close your eyes. I’ll be on the couch if you need anything.”

You shook your head, “This is why I’m in love with you, Javi. Always the perfect gentleman, even when you’re an asshole sometimes.”

Javier’s breath caught in his throat. He couldn’t deny your words this time. This was different. There was a difference between this is why I love you and this is why I’m in love with you. “In love? With me?” He told himself he wouldn’t pry earlier but the question came out before he could stop it.

“Oh yeah... I’ve had a big ol’ crush on you for a long time. I don’t know what the hell love is but I think I might have it for you.” The wall that kept back your deepest thoughts came crashing down and your sentiments came flooding out like a semi-coherent tidal wave of admittal. “This is why I didn’t want to say anything because I know you don’t like me like that. You got all these beautiful women at your beck and call and I’m just boring old me who’s scared of the dark, spends more time working than living, and couldn’t dream of looking as beautiful as those ladies do.”

Javier struggled to figure out what to say that wouldn’t be crossing the line, “There’s nothing boring about you, hermosa, and you are so much more beautiful than any other woman out there.”

“But you don’t love me.” You insisted, cutting him off.

He chewed the inside of his cheek. This had to be the worst time to be talking about this. If he said he did now, you probably wouldn’t remember it in the morning. Maybe you’d even write off your feelings as just drunken blubbering and he’d have to play along as if nothing had been meant. If he didn’t say it now, would it lock it in your mind that he couldn’t love you? “That’s not true.” He mumbled the words quietly but sincerely. He looked down at your form that was halfway asleep by now and pat your shoulder comfortingly, “Go to sleep. We can finish talking about this when you’re sober.”

By the time the words left his mouth, you were already snoring. With a heavy breath, he looked away from you and walked back into the living room. He kicked his shoes off by the table and laid down on the couch, getting comfortable beneath the blanket that you’d left there earlier. Your conversations ran through his head about a mile and minute and he couldn’t slow them down. You actually loved him- nay, were in love with him. His feelings weren’t one sided. He tossed and turned for a while, battling with himself on how to address this (or even if he wanted to). He wasn’t so drunk that he had no control over what he said but he was just drunk enough to fuel a confidence that made him devise a plan to admit his feelings for you in the morning, even if sober him would most likely back out.

When morning rolled around, neither of you were in the mood for admitting feelings. It took several cups of stove brewed coffee before either you were even able to form any more than a groan. The sunlight killed your eyes, even through the grey clouds. Your head pounded and you felt nauseous for the first half of the day. Javier was just slow and a little grumpier than usual. The two of you ate some tortillas that you’d thrown on the stovetop for breakfast in relative silence.

The power was still out, the constant drizzle outside making it too dangerous for the power lines to be worked on. Thankfully, the sun cast enough light for you to not be freaking out anymore. Around eleven in the morning, you were finally feeling a little better and you looked up at Javier, who still had yet to leave your apartment. “Thanks for staying last night. Sorry for getting wasted.” You laughed a little at your expense.

He sipped his coffee and rubbed his eyes, “Of course. You’re a mess when you drink, you know that?”

You buried your face in your hands, feeling your matted hair. Gosh, you needed a shower. “Yeah, I’ve been told that before. That’s why I don’t get that drunk very often.” You sipped your own coffee, reveling in the scent that a few hours ago made you feel sick to your stomach but now smelled like the best thing on this planet. “You can take a shower if you’d like.”

Javier gestured towards the front door, “I’ll just take one when I get back to my place.”

“Oh right, you live here,” You groaned and chuckled at your stupidity, “Sorry, my brain is still moving kinda slow.”

He smiled down at his coffee, fingers playing with the handle of the orange mug. “I, uh, I wanted to ask you about something, actually.” He began, his confidence from the prior night failing him. Javier could be suave as hell when he was trying to pick someone up at a bar but with you, all he could get was radio static in his brain.

Your face twisted nervously, “Oh gosh, did I say something totally stupid last night?” You were already mentally facepalming. There were about a million things that ran through your mind daily, even sober, that you would be humiliated if drunk you had let slip. Things that ranged from a stupid dream you’d had about strapping bombs to pigeons and flying them into Escobar’s fincas to your unrequited harbored love for Javier ran through your head and you desperately hoped you had dumbly mentioned the former of the two topics. You could handle being teased about pigeon bombs. You didn’t want to lose Javier forever because you had your crush on him slip.

One of Javier’s hands moved to his thigh and ran up and down the rough fabric of his jeans. “No, it wasn’t stupid at all, actually.” His pause made you nervous, expecting only the worst. “You said that you were in love with me.”

Oh gosh. This was it. The moment you feared most.

“I did?” You asked like a deer caught in headlights. You could feel your face visibly pale as you stared at Javier with wide eyes. His eyes flicked from yours down to his coffee and you panicked, “I’m sorry. I didn’t-”

“I love you too.” He interrupted quickly and bluntly, knowing that if he waited any longer either you’d say it wasn’t true or he’d back out and either way it resulted in him never getting the words out. This was his shot at happiness and he was going to take it.

Your mouth moved with failed words before finally sputtering out, “I’m sorry, what?”

“I love you, Y/N. And I’m sorry if you didn’t mean it and I just ruined everything but you said last night that we sit around and make ourselves miserable by convincing ourselves that it could never happen and I just- I just figured I’d try to find a way out of the misery.” Javier wasn’t one for grand gestures or sappy heartfelt speeches but the confidence he’d had last night had returned to him for only a second to give you the closest he’d ever gotten to either.

His words seemed to snap you right out of your foggy hangover haze and you couldn’t seem to take your eyes off him and the way his brown eyes seemed to bore into yours with a depth that made you almost scared to look away. “I-I love you too, Javi.”

His eyes lightened up and his mustaches quirked upwards with his lips in a cautious smile, “Really?”

You nodded, your voice breathy when you whispered out, “Yeah. I just- I never thought you could love me.”

“Hermosa, I don’t know how anyone couldn’t.”

#javier pena #javier pena x reader #javier pena imagines #javier pena fics #javier pena x y/n #javier pena x you #narcos #narcos imagines #narcos fics #narcos drabbles #narcos headcanons #pedro pascal #pedro pascal fluff #pedro pascal imagine #pedro pascal x reader #pedro pascal x you

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mimik-u · 3 years

Text

“Homeworld Bound” Thoughts:

I wasn’t going to watch this one today, but then I realized that I really missed the Diamonds and wanted to consume novel content, so!

OOH, good on the show for taking us directly to the aftermath of “Fragments” instead of putting space between the episodes. That’s just... a really good choice narrative wise.

Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl’s expressions are so distressing here. He’s been gone for three days; they must’ve been so worried.

Jasper steps aside to reveal an absolutely ruined Steven.

He just technically killed a gem and then resurrected her. How intensely will that forever lie on his psyche? Oh my g od

NO, NOT JASPER PASSIVELY MAKING THE DIAMOND SIGN IN THE BACKGROUND AUGH

“You can’t just disappear for days without telling us!”

Steven silent walking up to the Observatory as the Gems continue to freak the fuck out is harrowing. And Dee Dee Magno Hall is killing it with her voice acting here. The simultaneous fear and anger and horror in her voice. Oh my g d

“You guys... I love you, but you can’t help me anymore. I’ve been avoiding the only people in the entire universe who can.” 🥺 This is sad, but I’m also, like, problematic grandmas time!!!!!

“Find something better to do with your life.” God, Jasper’s look of disbelief and sadness here. I didn’t really delve into this during my “Fragments” watch because I was just roridoodwrjfkrkeke reeling, but her reaction to being accidentally shattered is psychologically devastating???? I’d wager that she simultaneously respects the fact that she’s been subjugated by a being more powerful than her, that she’s grateful to Steven for being both subjugator and savior, and likely, she’s conflating this new loyalty with her former loyalty for Pink. This is a really complex psyche (a tragic one most of all).

Garnet: “Steven, remember, we’ll always be your family.” I’m so fucki n emo

AWHWHWH, HOMEWORLD IS SO BRIGHT AND COLORFUL NOW!!!

YO!! Homeworld has a democracy now!! The Zircons!!!!!!!

THE WALL GEM IS MOVING??????? KWOEOEIDJDKSJS

Can u imagine being a wall cursed with sentience. that is so funny on so many levels

But it’s also really interesting, too. If the Wall Gem is a gem in the way say Topazes are gems, which, judging by her mobility, she is—then her explicit purpose in Era 1-2, as molded by presumably Yellow, was to b a wall omg. (Or, arguably, I think it can be argued that the inanimate object Gems, like Comby, were probably accidental sentient creations, made in relationship to their proximity to the Diamonds during their various secretion rituals!!)

Anyway, I love thinking about Homeworld worldbuilding. It’s fascinating.

SQUARE PERIDOT

SPIIIIIINELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL!

Her heart eyes!! She looks so happy!

Steven, angry af: “Spinel, what is wrong with you?” / Spinel: Oh, you know—the usual.” KEKDSKDK

Also, Steven really wanted to say fuck there. NEKDDKKSSKKS

“I was such a wreck then, but I am so much better now.” We stan character growth 😭😭

One thing I have loved the Crewniverse so much for doing is never taking away the physical signs of gems’ mental distress, even after they’ve gotten better: Blue’s eye bags, Volleyball’s eye, Spinel’s running mascara. That is so important.

YELLOW SITTING AT HER LIL VANITY!!

IT’S LIGHT INSIDE HER ROOM! THERE R FLOWERS! THRIVE, QUEEN, THRIVE.

YELLOW REVERSING HER GEM EXPERIMENTS OH MY G D

FUCKING QUEEN!!!!!!

(I’m sorry in advance. The rest of the live blog is just going to be screaming about the Diamonds.)

“I can permanently alter any physical form!” She’s so proud of herself. 😭😭😭 I fuckin’ love her.

Yellow laying down on the ground like that is SENDING ME SKSKSJSJ.

Ugh, and her being such a good mom to Spinel. I’m cry in f

“If anything’s out of proportion, it’s your temper. You can be big if you want to, or you can be small if you want to, but if you’re going to be upset no matter what, then this problem isn’t physical—it’s emotional. Go see Blue.”

I really like her advice here because it’s advice that comments so clearly on her own character arc. At her lowest, she was quick to anger, aggressive, and temperamental, which she diagnoses in Steven here. Additionally, she was the Diamond who was concerned largely with physical actions. She coped by maintaining the Empire through conquering planets and maintaining the minutiae of leadership; she thought the only way to receive justice for Pink was through the physical act of destruction. And in doing so, she pushed her own emotions deep, deep down until they manifested in anger, aggressiveness, and temperamental outbursts. This hurt the people she cared about, and it hurt herself most of all.

Also, “Go see Blue. That is her department.” Ejdoiddjdjjsjdjdks, “go see ur other grandma.”

BLUE FLOATING ON A CLOUD!!!!!

“Your powers have been causing you dramatic mood swings? That seems awfully troubling Steven.” God I love her

“You don’t seem troubled.” This is a really interesting line because it comments on how Blue’s emotions, especially her negatively charged ones, used to be so visible all over her; indeed, she both wittingly and actively used to project them on other Gems, forcing them to feel her suffering, too.

OH, SHE GOES ON TO SAY THE EXACT SAME THING EOEODODISSJJS. LISTEN, I REALLY VIBE WITH BLUE.

“Back before you came into my life, Steven, I wanted every one to feel the pain I felt. I realized I must make up for my awful behavior by bringing joy to others.”

Another thing I’ve appreciated about the writing in this episode: So far, both Blue and Yellow have used the adjective awful to describe their former actions. It’s the self-awareness and the refusal to try to excuse themselves that powerfully shows how much they’ve grown. And it’s their continuous endeavors to keep moving forward, to help the Gems that they’ve hurt, that indicates that they’re willing to constantly keep growing and atoning.

NFOFOFDKSSKSKSK, THESE CLOUDS ARE JUST HER VAPORIZED TEARS HELP.

Sick vape clouds, Blue

I’VE HEARD THE SONG BEFORE, BUT EVERY TIME SHE SINGS, I LOSE MY SHI T

LISA HANNNNIGAAAAAAAN

This is such a pretty line: “Cold palace walls, and endless empty halls, haunted by echoes of laughter.”

BLUE ASCENDING THROUGH THE CLOUDS AUSHAHHSHD

BLUE MAKING HEART CLOUDS FOR SPINEL!!

BLUE CALLING SPINEL N STEVEN HER LITTLE REASONS WHY.

“I’LL NEVER MAKE YOU CRY.” This line is particularly lovely because I think it plays well with Steven’s line to her in “CYM:” “How many times did you make her cry?”

BDJDJDJSJDJ, BLUE LAYING ON HER CLOUD LIKE YELLOW LAID ON THE FLOOR.

The way she sings the last “loving you.” 😭😭😭😭 I’m gonna weep. I love her so fucking much.

“I found happiness. If that's not something you think you deserve, then I suspect this is an issue of self worth. I suggest you go to White for assistance with such matters.” 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭 And like Yellow did, Blue gets to the heart of her arc cleanly.

Before Steven and before her own emotional reckoning, she didn’t think it was her place to be happy: “I know my purpose isn’t to be happy.” But in learning to love others, Blue has found true, inner happiness, which she literally shares with others. Wow.

And I think there’s something powerful in her distinction between true happiness and self-worth. You can’t find one without espousing the other.

White’s room is so pretty. 🥺

THE FLASHING STROBE LIGJTS DDNJDFJDJDNF.

SPINEL WHITE DIAMOND?!/!:$;8;83&:&:

SHE FUCKING LETS OTHER GEMS CONTROL HE R HELP.

SPINEL MAKING WHITE TAP DANCE FICODODOFODJDNDJSJDJDJJDDJDJ

Steven’s horrified expression omg

“I’m scared I’m gonna hurt people; I guess I already have.” God.

And that’s another thing that this episode has called to mind. Blue, Yellow, and White alike once used their insane powers to hurt other Gems and to hurt themselves, and here, throughout this series, we see Steven discovering that same capacity for destruction and self-destruction. Along with the systematic oppressions they facilitated, a big part of the Diamonds’ modus operandi was that their powers were directly correlated to their mental states and their various inabilities to confront their own selves and effect inner change. The corrective wasn’t necessarily Steven; the corrective was him helping them to do that initial act of introspection and looking inwards. And so, too, will Steven have to do the same by the end of this series. But I presume that his family, all the people and gems who have loved and cared for him, will in effect be his Steven, just as he has always been for them.

“Half a Diamond, half a creature of Earth—in all the universe there's no one else that could know what you’re going through, so maybe it's time you talked to yourself.” This is so viscerally sad. White hits the nail on the head here. Steven’s human friends/family and his gem family and even the Diamonds, who come the closest to matching his own strength, can never fully understand him. It’s the tension that underscores a lot, if not the entire show.

White briefly touches Steven with her nail, and you can viscerally see the trauma on his face; he hasn’t forgotten her act above all, wrenching his gem out, nearly killing him.

“I’m... I’m a Diamond.” Steven, in looking at White Diamond, realizes that she’s a mirror of himself. Holy fucking shit

“I don’t want to be you! I don’t want to be anything like you!” HOLY FUCKING SHIT

“Don’t hurt me! She can’t hurt me! I’m controlling her...” And here, Steven doesn’t light upon the essential thing... in making White punch the wall, nearly knocking a huge rock into him, he’s the one hurting himself.

This show, oh my g o d

“She’s the one who should be afraid.” STEVEN?!!!!????!??!

“No, stop it! I don’t like this!” / “Please, you’re scaring me.” OH MY GO D

HE FUCKING MADE HER SLAM HER GEM AGAINST A PILLAR HOLY HE LL

“What... what was that?” Christine’s delivery here. Holy shit. 😭😭 And both of them are surrounded in the carnage of Steven’s wrath. Holy fucking shit.

This act is fundamentally different than him accidentally shattering Jasper in “Fragments”; this was an intentional attempt to hurt White, to crack her, to break her. Holy fucking shit

Spinel, Blue, and Yellow waiting for Steven outside of White’s door has my heart a little and a lot tender 🥺🥺🥺🥺

SPINEL SINGING I CAN MAKE A CHANGE SO DRAMATICALLY DJDIDJDJDJDJD. (But yeah, lmao, this will absolutely be the conclusion of Steven’s arc at the end of Future.)

“Steven! Let us help you, Steven!” The Diamonds are so concerned (mirroring the Gems back at home, too). 😭😭

He leaves a flip flop behind like Cinderella lmao

“Steven, let us help you!” / “We’re your family!” 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

And just as he implored the CGs, he tells the Diamonds not to follow him either.

Steven is completely and utterly alone.

Not by necessity.

But God, by choice.

Okay, this is my new favorite Future episode.

#blue diamond #white diamond #yellow diamond #steven universe #spinel #s: future #mimiku #DIEOEODJDDNSNSJJD #this episode really did it for me

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yungimmortals · 3 years

Text

fugue state | aurelia & ben

date: september 8, 2021 summary: blackouts, the long island public transit, a sunny cafe, and an unlikely alliance

She came to when a rude old woman jostled her arm with her purse as she walked past. Her body felt was made of molasses, her limbs too heavy to move. She blinked slowly, clearing dancing spots from her vision and found herself squinting in hard sunlight. Where were her glasses? Instinctively, her hand flew up to the crown of her head, hoping to slide them down to her face. They were not there. A twig, however, was. She plucked it from her hair, staring at it with a look that slowly became one of horror as her gaze tunneled, staring at her hand.

Though withered no longer, her hand was covered in smears of dirt. One of her nails was cracked and there was a bit of red in her nail bed. She had injured herself then. But how? And where was she? Aurelia felt her panic rising. She dropped the twig and bolted to her feet, only to realize that she was on...a bus? How had she gotten here? She felt sick, nearly swooning back into her seat as she sat down hard. "No...no no nononono no," she moaned, her voice low and eerie. A few of the passengers eyed her uneasily. Others looked around to see if anyone else had noticed the girl covered in twigs and leaves and dirt, but none of them said a word to her as she continued her cry.

Ben noticed the hair first. Then the dazed, distant expression on their face. But they were several rows behind him before he could even lower the volume on his phone, so he let it go. It wasn’t until several minutes later, after a particularly large amount of people exited, that he noticed them again. He didn’t even hear the outburst, but he saw a few people glancing back nervously, so he followed suit.

Oh. He definitely recognized her. He remembered her particularly demanding coffee orders. But now she just looked scared. Ben yanked his headphones out and stood. He quietly apologized to the person he climbed over, and then again to the people he squeezed past on their way away from… “Um, Aria?” No, that wasn’t right, but hopefully it was close enough. He hesitated, then placed his hand on her arm. “What’s going on?”

Her hands were over her ears now and she was curling in on herself, trying to melt into the seat of the bus. She didn't know how she had gotten here. Or where she had been. She couldn't remember. She couldn't remember she couldn't remembershecouldn'tremember.

A touch on her arm jolted her out of her spiral and she bared her teeth ever-so-slightly at the person infringing on her personal space. Her fractured mind fought to place his worried face. The barista. "Aurelia." She corrected, her voice hoarse. She sounded foreign to herself and she whimpered as a shadow seemed to loom at the edge of her vision. It was gone as quickly as it had come. She was having a hard time focusing on the barista. "I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. No no nonononono," Aurelia covered her ears again, her eyes staring at something unseen.

“Okay,” Ben said, calm and gentle in the wake of her panic. Now that he’d stepped in, the other passengers gave him a wide berth. He glanced toward the front of the bus, then pressed on the STOP button. “Do you know where you are?” he asked Aurelia, turning back to her. He tried contact again, this time putting a light touch on her leg. “Can you focus on me?”

Aurelia shook her head, a miserable sound coming from her mouth. "I don't know," she repeated. She could feel tears welling up in her eyes and that, of all things, was what brought her into the moment. She scrubbed at her eyes with the heel of her hand, the other shielding her eyes in the light as she tried to look at the barista. "It...is very bright." It was a struggle to get the words out and she didn't know if he would understand. She was of the Underworld, more and moreso by the day. "I don't know where I am. I don't know how I got here. I don't know when I got here." She pressed the hand not shielding her eyes to her throat, trying to quell the unsettling feeling that was threatening to overtake her.

The bus was still moving, but Ben wasn't sure how long it would take to get her to her feet. Being outside would probably help, he thought, but she was complaining about the light and now he wasn't so sure. "You're on a bus, on Long Island. It's headed west. Do you want to get off? We can find... um... someplace shady to sit. Less people." He felt like he was grasping at straws, offering things he might want if he were this distressed on public transport. She didn't brush his hand away, so he kept it there. "Or is there something else I can do?"

At his description, Aurelia blanched. She squeezed her eyes shut and found his hand, grasping it like a lost child. "Off the bus. Please. But—" She tried her best to explain. "It is too bright, the light hurts. I have, I lost my— Red glasses." The words felt like they were being scraped from her throat. "They are enchanted. I can't remember if they were with me. I can't remember anything. I can't—" She choked back a sob, her grip on his wrist tightening as she frantically looked around, trying to spot the gold frames. Had they fallen under a seat? Had she ever had them at all? She felt small, weak, vulnerable. And in front of a stranger. The shame. She did not want to rely on him but here she was, clutching onto the barista like he was her lifeline. "Was I on the bus...this whole time? Did you see?"

Surprised at the sudden intense grasp, Ben inhaled sharply, but he forced himself to exhale slow and quiet. It wouldn't do anyone any good if he let his concern bleed into nervousness. "I think, um, about ten minutes. Let me..." He looked at the seat behind them, but the passenger was adamantly ignoring the situation: eyes closed, headphones in, unresponsive. With a sigh, he slid off the seat he was kneeling on and angled his body under the seats. It was awkward, a little painful, especially since he kept hold on Aurelia's hand that stretched his arm oddly. But, he found what he was looking for: a pair of glasses, gilded with deep red lenses. Ben quickly snatched them up just as the bus rolled to a stop. The doors hissed open as he held them up for her to see. "These?"

He had found them. She couldn't even remember his name or is she had been nice to him in the past (doubtful), and still, he had found her glasses. Releasing his wrist, she snatched them out of his hands, practically jamming the wireframes onto her nose. Anything to dull the light, the stubborn light that was making her head ache. She closed her eyes for a moment, as the movement of the bus ceased. Her glasses were a small comfort. Why was he helping her? Quietly, she thanked him, her eyes darting to where he had held onto him. "Did I hurt you? I'm sorry." It felt to vulnerable to admit, but he had already seen her at her most vulnerable, so Aurelia murmured, "I am frightened. I don't know what's happening to me." Now that the bus wasn't moving, she uncurled herself from her position and stood, slowly this time. Her limbs no longer felt like molasses but the shivers of anxiety had not left her system yet. He was blocking her path so she had no choice but to wait for him, unless she wanted to push her way past to the exit.

He still wasn't sure what was going on, but it must be demigod adjacent, if magic glasses were involved. Ben would ask more questions later: right now his primary focus was getting outside. "We'll figure it out," he assured her, standing along with her. As soon as he confirmed that she was steady, Ben led the way out. Where they were, he had no idea, but he'd worry about that later. Ben didn't go far from Aurelia; his arms hovered slightly, ready to catch her if need be, as they stepped onto the curb. "Do you want to sit? There's..." He looked down the sidewalk. "There's benches over there, I think."

They were outside, finally. It was tempting to fall to her knees, to clutch at the grass, to feel soil on her skin — by her choice this time. But already, she had caused enough of a scene and thought it best to remain upright. He hovered around her, the gesture protective as they moved to the benches. Once seated, a cursory search of her person revealed that Aurelia’s phone was not with her but she was wearing her enchanted bangle. From the pockets of her skirt, she pulled out two inhuman teeth, what looked like a chunk of amethyst, and a bundle of twine. Setting this strange collection on her lap, she looked over to him and cleared her throat. “You. Why did you help me? I don’t know you. I don’t know much of anything at the moment.” Her voice cracked as she let out a joyless laugh.

Ben stood next to the bench at first, wanting to give her some space. It was only when she addressed him that he cautiously lowered himself into the seat beside her. His eyes flickered to the odd assortment, many questions on his tongue. "Um." Ben wasn't really sure what to say. She needed help so he gave it. Though, now that he thought about it, he wasn't entirely sure he hadn't been... pushed. They were both demigods, at least he thought so. She was something if she was living in New Athens. Maybe the gods helped their paths cross. Ben swallowed and shrugged. "I just thought I should." He faltered a bit before continuing; without realizing, he'd started rubbing circles into the palm of his hand with his thumb. "I've been there. Like, disoriented and, um, alone. I know how scary it can be."

Mindlessly, she turned the silver band, over and over around her wrist. She was filthy, covered in grime from whatever she had been doing before she regained control, but miraculously her bangle remained untarnished. His answer filled Aurelia with a feeling she couldn't place. He had simply helped her because he thought it was right, a stranger enacting kindness. How foreign an idea it seemed. She swallowed and looked away to speak, her voice still shaky. She appreciated his help, though the gaps in her memory had left her feeling raw, exposed. "Ah. It is...not pleasant. As you know, I guess. So...thank...you. I don't know what I would have done. I realize I also...I don't know your name."A shadow swirled beneath the bench and she twitched, averting her eyes quickly. One of the teeth fell from her lap, embedding itself point-first in the dirt. Aurelia grimaced at it.

He tried to pay no mind to the moving shadows, or the fallen tooth, but a persistent chill slithered up his spine. "I'm Ben," he told her, angling his body so he was facing Aurelia, despite her head still being turned away. "So, you don't have, um, any memory of how you got on the bus, right?" Was gently prodding her for information the right call? Nothing that he could think to do felt quite correct. "What's the last thing you do remember?"

"No memory..." Aurelia murmured, her voice sounding far away to her own ears. Something was calling out to her, a whisper in the back of her mind. Her fingers flexed without her telling them to and she stared down at her lap, wideyed. Panic was beginning to rise in her chest again as she watched her left hand twitch once more, then go still. "I remember looking into a pool. One of the fountains in town, maybe? It is foggy to think of. I don't—" The fingers on her left hand moved again, almost experimental. She felt like a marionette, puppeteered by unseen strings and a whimper rose in her throat.

Ben watched her hand twitch one, twice, three times before he finally reached out and grasped her fingers. Not too tight, but firmly enough to hopefully stop the involuntary movement. Was it involuntary? The panic rolling off of her implied as much. "Okay," he murmured, once again quashing his own worry down. He'd seen plenty of strange things, he reminded himself. Ben slid off the seat so he was kneeling in front of Aurelia, her hand still encased in his own. "Focus on me. I think you should take some deep breaths."

Her hand moved again without her control, but only one time, now that Ben was holding her fingers with his own hand. The shadow beneath the bench reached towards Ben, then retreated like the tide as she watched. Aurelia forced herself to drag her eyes away from the pooling shadow and over to Ben. She nodded, inhaling a shaky breath. Then a shaky exhale. Then a slightly less shaky inhale. Her eyes burned behind her glasses, her cheeks felt wet. "What is happening to me...?"

"Right now I think you're having a panic attack," Ben said on his exhale; he started breathing deeply, too, hoping she would mirror him. She might have been asking about all the other weird things happening around her, but he had no idea how to explain that. He breathed in again, held it a bit, then exhaled again. "Or some kind of anxiety." Inhale, again. Exhale. Inhale. "Has this happened to you before? The memory loss?"

“A panic attack,” she echoed, in between breaths. It had been silly to ask. He wouldn't have the answers she sought. Especially without knowing all the pieces of the puzzle. The only one who knew the answer to her question would rather laugh than reveal her secrets. Aurelia felt a jab of hatred, this she funneled into more even breathing. “Yes. And no. Months ago. And then nothing, my memories intact. And then…” Aurelia shuddered, her patron’s retribution fresh in her mind. “There is a gap in my memories, from last week. And now.”

It took Ben a few moments to piece together, but he eventually got the picture. "Okay," he said again, trying to sound as reassuring as possible. "That's fine. We'll figure that out later. Just keep breathing." They weren't going to solve anything or go anywhere with her so distraught, so Ben just opted to wait there, sit with her until the worst of it passed. Once her breathing seemed to stay consistently steady, he ventured some more questions. "Do you think you can walk a bit? We can go get some water, maybe food, too, if you're up for it? I think it'll help."

Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. This exercise in measured breathing lasted a few minutes, until Aurelia felt less like crying and more like fighting. Good, she preferred to be angry. It made her productive. In lieu of answering Ben, she rose from the bench, one hand still enveloped in his. The remaining objects that had been in her lap were clutched in her other hand, digging into her palm. "Food, yes. And water." She took a few steps closer to the street, looking for a sign that would give her an idea of their location. A chill ran down the back of her neck and dead things flickered in her vision before disappearing. "If you look around, be subtle," she hissed. "I feel we are being watched." When she looked out the corner of her eye, the tooth that had fallen to the dirt was gone. "We should leave."

Ben followed her lead. He was relieved that she seemed to be returning to her usual self, but that was undercut with a fresh stab of worry. Being watched? This wasn’t what he signed up for, but he wasn’t about to leave her now. He glanced at the tooth in the ground, only to discover it was missing. For some reason, this chilled him more than anything else. “Agreed,” he said quietly. Ben kept his head forward and adjusted his grip on her hand. Did he look casual enough, or was it clear in his posture how uncertain he was?

Just around the corner was a line of shops, and Ben indicated the nearest cafe-looking place with his chin. “There? Or should we just, um, walk a bit more?”

Keeping her steps as steady as possible, Aurelia held her head high. They rounded the corner and she looked down at their hands, still entwined. Normally, she would shrug off this contact. But now it was a comfort and she held fast to it as they turned the corner.

Immediately, Aurelia's eyes scanned the cafe, zeroing in on a shadow that seemed to slither out of sight. She narrowed her eyes at the table and chairs it had disappeared under and glanced over at Ben. "That is perfect. We should sit inside." Without waiting for an answer, she dragged him to the shop and into a sunny booth. Though the light strained her eyes, this was a talk not to be had in the shadows. Aurelia stared at Ben intently, then folded her hands in front of her. When she spoke, her voice was strained. "What I'm about to tell you remains between us. Please. Swear it."

Ben thought that sitting inside was the opposite of what they should do— fresh air was better, wasn't it? But he didn't find the words or voice to protest before Aurelia was already pulling him past the door. Immediately the direct sun made him warm under his long-sleeved black tee; he almost rolled his sleeves up, then thought better of it and just mirrored Aurelia's position. "Sure," he said quickly. "I won't tell anyone." His eyes didn't waver as he spoke, despite the concern still rumbling inside his mind. He hoped it was clear in his tone, his steady gaze, that he was taking this—whatever it was that was going on, or at the very least her obvious distress— seriously.

The paranoid part of her wanted to hear him swear on the Styx but the pragmatic part of her knew that that was too big to ask. He seemed sincere enough and he had given her every reason to trust him. Aurelia adjusted her posture so that she was angled across the table towards Ben, making her hushed voice as inconspicuous as possible. "I know you have seen some strange things today. I know I am missing a large part of today. I can explain this. It will sound outlandish, but it is the truth." She broke off to glance around the cafe. When nothing struck her as suspicious, she continued in a whisper. "I do not own my soul. She who does, likes to remind me of this. It is her favorite game. That is what you have seen today."

He was hyperaware of the sun, now, radiating heat that was getting trapped underneath his shirt. He could feel a bead of sweat rolling down his spine, and for a moment, there was nothing else. Ben was just sitting here, warm and getting warmer, refusing to stomach the weight of that confession. "That..." That's horrific, that's unfair, that's worse than death. "That..." Her soul, her life, was not hers. A part of him wanted to not believe it, wanted to call the words a dramatic metaphor for a controlling, vindictive person in Aurelia's life. That he could understand a little more, could hold in his hands. But he saw the emptiness in her eyes earlier. He knew the kind of powers that existed just out of sight. "Fuck." Ben swallowed and leaned over the table, lowering his voice to match hers. "Is there any way to get out of it?"

Aurelia seemed to shrink into herself for a moment, her eyes downcast as the weight of her confession settled on her shoulders. There was more, she would tell him if he would hear it. "I..." She wanted to say that, yes there was. That she had to fulfill an agreement and she would be free. But the terms her patron had given were foggy in her mind and she couldn't recall if that were true. If she found what the goddess needed, would she be free to live her second life? Or would she crumble into ash and dust and shadow? "I don't know," Aurelia said evenly, looking up at Ben once more. "I detested the hand I was dealt. I lost everything. And when I had nothing, I...made a pact. It was foolish, incredibly foolish. That much I see now. But...I think that I would do it again. The alternative—" She broke off, clenching her fists as she shuddered. "There was no alternative. Not for me."

She got smaller in response to his question, and Ben wondered if he asked the wrong thing. But soon enough, she continued, and he gave her the space to fumble out an explanation, his teeth grinding together as he listened. Eventually, he nodded, though the motion was so small it might as well been a flinch. "I get it," he mumbled. And he did. Their lives seemed very different, but Ben understood what it was like to live with the weight of a rash decision. He understood both regretting it and not, wavering between mindsets with ever bitter reminder of what he'd done. His circumstance would never change, but maybe it didn't have to be the same for her. "Is it..." He released a shaky breath, then tried again. "Your... um, the one who... Is she a god?"

"A forgotten one," Aurelia said, before she gave much thought to her words. Her hands flew to cover her mouth and for a moment, she held her breath. When there was no retaliation— no limbs moving out of her control, no shadows trying to creep closer, no blackness leaking from her pores— she relaxed, running her hands over her hair to compose herself. "Ah, she would hate that I said that. That doesn't make it any less true. Nor does it make her any less powerful."

It was hard to watch how terribly afraid Aurelia was just talking about this god, as if she was going to be struck down at any instant. As if she was betraying something just by speaking her mind. Protective, empathetic rage shot through Ben like a spike splitting him open. His throat burned and his posture was rigid, but he kept his expression as stoic as he could. "What can I do to help?"

It felt good— if slightly taboo— to tell someone about her pact...and to be believed. He believed her and he wanted to help her. Aurelia's mouth opened but no sound came out as she found herself overwhelmed by the gesture. She scrubbed a hand over her face, remembering belatedly that her hands were covered in dirt. "I am searching for something. One small problem." Aurelia lifted her head, white pieces of hair obscuring half her face as she smiled thinly. "I have no idea what it is. I was told that I would know when I found it."

“Sounds like something a god would say,” Ben mused ruefully. His rage quickly simmered, but still there was a fissure down his middle, a crater where the spike had been. How comfortable he’d become, since taking up this tentative alliance with his mother. How quickly he’d forgotten just how fucked the gods could be. Aurelia hadn’t meant to, but she’d taken him by the shoulders and turned him to face a different path than the one he’d been walking down the last few months. For a moment, he thought he could feel eyes on his back, a fleeting hope that maybe, maybe, she’d help. Was that his own thought or something being whispered in his ear? Ben shook his head; he’d consider that later. “Okay. I’ll get us some water. Then we can…” He sighed, unused to being the one coming up with a plan. “You can tell me where you’ve already looked, and we’ll go from there.”

“Thank you. I cannot express what your willingness to help means to me.” Aurelia exhaled a laugh, looking away from Ben to focus on her hands. Her manicure was chipped, there was dirt in her cuticles. She started to pick some of it away, giving herself something to focus on now that she could feel her energy beginning to ebb. When Ben stood up from the table to go find water, Aurelia pulled a napkin and pen across the table. In her crooked scrawl, she began to make a list. Now that she had someone willing to help her through what had felt so incredibly impossible only hours ago, Aurelia felt her boldness return.

One way or another, her debt would be paid.

#m: aurelia #aurelia&ben #aurelia&ben 001 #chatzy #fugue state

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movedyourchair505 · 5 years

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Napule Nights - quarantaquattro

The finale has started - and there are quite a few chapters of it. It’s been a long time coming, thanks to Elana for developing it all with me. Don’t hate me x

- chapter navigation -

As safe as she felt, and as much as Alexander had reassured her, Jade caught herself worrying as she sat next to Kane, wondering incessantly if he was safe, if despite his recent triumphs there were risks to his business meetings and export deals, her worries only growing when she saw Helders continuously picking up his phone, his face not more serious than it usually was, but she couldn't help her concern, ached to see Alexander once the night was over, to be in the comfort of his confidence and reassurance and offer as much as she could in return.

“Y'know 'e'll beh alreyht” Miles said, sipping on the colourful cocktail in his hand, raising his eyebrows at the obvious doubts that distressed her features. “'s not the first deal 'e's ever made, bella.”

She rolled her eyes, bringing her glass to her lips and taking a sip of her own. “Well” she said. “I know he feels like he's invincible right now” she said.

“Doesn't 'e 'ave evreh reason teh?”

Jade licked her lips. “I suppose.” Before she could continue, letting her eyes wander past Kane's shoulder, her body froze, her every moment ceasing when her eyes locked with an icy, piercing gaze, a bitter smile spread across a face that paralleled no other in the hatred it evoked inside Jade and she rose to her feet as soon as she found it in herself to bring her body into motion again, Kane catching on and following her gaze before she had to inform him of the horror that had just entered.

“Oh, no need to rise for me.”

Jade swallowed, the mere tone of her voice making her want to squeeze her hand around the blonde's throat, the only thing stopping her the two henchmen flanking her.

“But I do appreciate it.”

“Adriana, 'ow dare ya show your face?” Kane asked, stretching his fingers. “Ya fook Al over like tha', become 'is enemy's little toy. Makin' sure his dick stays wet, yeah? And then ya show up 'ere?”

She raised her eyebrows, the look on her face remaining unimpressed, the conceded smile not shaken, making Jade want to wipe it right off, to kick her face repeatedly with her heel. “Last time I checked...” Adriana said slowly, letting her eyes wander around the club. “This was no-man's-land.”

“Per'aps” Miles cut in. “I joost didn't know they let in cheap skanks like yourself.”

“Mmm...” she said, nodding slowly. “I think we both know you were keeping Alexander's dick wet for a very long time” she said. “How jealous are you that he replaced you? And what he replaced you with? He really can't be on his own, can he?”

Jade flinched, felt her hands, her whole body ultimately aching to lay her hands on the woman in front of her, scratch out her eyes and make sure she would never dare say Alexander's name ever again. It was Helders that held her back this time.

“We'll all be better off once you realise how much power and influence I still have. How much more even. But that's not what I'm here for.”

It was Jade's second instinct now to leave, well-aware it would be counter-productive for all parties – first and foremost for Alexander – if she caused Adriana any sort of physical harm. But she knew that Alex would also want to know the nature of her seeking them out specifically, that he would be furious if they didn't find out as much as they could despite everything. “Then why are you here, zoccola?” She asked, adjusting the strap of her tight, crimson red dress, her blood red lips hardly differing in shade, her stare as bright as the stone around her neck.

“Both of you should watch your mouths” Adriana said, an edge to her voice that Jade hadn't heard before, she could tell she was slowly getting to her. “You might think things are safe and fine now since Turner walked out of the meeting with Marco. I'll offer you one last deal before Alfonso will end this feud … this war with force.”

“No one's bloodeh scared of ya, sweet'eart” Kane said, shaking his head and turning back to take a sip from his drink. “Go back teh hell where ya belong.”

Jade shot Adriana back a sweet smile that surpassed hers in complacency by miles, then copied Kane's movements, although was aware that finding out about Adriana, declaring war on them for Alfonso, it would invade Alexander's self-assured attitude he'd carried with himself since the meeting with Mancini, but maybe it was what they wanted, Alex had made it out to be as if they did not have the power and were therefore desperate to gamble with threats, overestimating their own possibilities.

Yet she couldn't help the rising tension within her, worried now not only about Alexander and the deal he was making now, but also about him possibly underestimating Alfonso. The deal had been rather spontaneous, she didn't know many details, tried to gloss over her worry and instead engage in conversation with Miles, until he spoke in passing of the clients having close contacts in San Marino. She ultimately anticipated returning to Alexander now, making sure that things were okay, relieved when Helders gave a signal for them, for positive or negative purpose, it was something other than trying to busy herself when she really wanted to help and improve the situation for the business and most importantly, Alexander, at least she felt like there was some sort of purpose as they drove back to the headquarters, although worrying slightly when Miles asked if he could be dropped off, and Helders gave a shrug, stating it was only Jade he had to bring to the headquarters anyway, leaving her with the task to tell him about Adriana.

She knew that above being thrown off in the security of his plans, he would be angry, angry that there was some sort of threat from the outside, that they'd gone to a club outside his territory, that Adriana and possibly everyone she worked for might have been close to her as well as Kane and she tried to justify things in her head, tried to portray them mildly, all the while looking out the window to escape the intensity of Helders' eyes resting on her.

She avoided his gaze as he opened the door for her, escorted her to the entrance and held the heavy door open for her, the echo of his steps ringing down the silent corridor as well as the clicks of her heels as they headed for Alexander's office. For a moment, she wondered if maybe he already knew, was relieved that he seemed to be okay if he was asking for her, but maybe Helders had already told him, it wouldn't have been the first time, but the firm tone in his voice when after a knock he called her inside and the look in his eyes when she entered and the door fell shut behind her suggested that he wasn't slightly angry or agitated with the danger that Adriana's appearance posed, but that something else had happened.

“Jade.”

There was nothing fond in his tone, he was stood in front of his desk, pushing himself forward before approaching her with slow steps, the look had her physically aching to touch him, to evoke some sort of reaction that would reassure her and not remind her of the only time he'd put his fingers around her neck as a serious threat. She swallowed hard. “Alexander.”

He was silent, stretching his jaw, his features tense, lips pressed together. His eyes were locked on hers exclusively, his poise never faltering, his gaze never wandering until she couldn't stand the silence. “Adriana just threatened us.”

There was no change in his expression, except for a slight twitch of his eye, his jaw locked. “They dun't 'ave the power for a threat that isn't empty” he said, discarding the warning in an instant, as nothing more than a slight annoyance, not important enough to even be an inconvenience. “It dun't matter.”

“Alexander, did you hear-...”

“Enough” he spat, the way his voice cut through the silence of the office a sharp contrast to the calm and collected tone she was used to even when he was angry. “Dun't yeh try teh distract meh wif nonsense like that.” He stepped closer to her. “Did yeh seriousleh fink I wouldn't find out?”

She'd parted her lips to respond before she'd heard him out, but his words threw her off, her heart beginning to pound in her chest at rapid speed. “Find out what? I just-...”

“This were yehr plan all along then, yeh?”

Only now that she was trying to adjust to his sudden anger, she could see the hurt in his eyes, a sense of pain that the anger undoubtedly stemmed from and she swallowed, once again resisted the urge to touch him, this time to soothe him rather than herself. She knew she was beyond soothing now, not if he was going to say the words she'd been afraid of since she'd set foot in the headquarters with her body tainted in bruises.

He was certain, almost momentarily consoled by the fact that her eyes rested on his so she could not see the way his hands were shaking, stretching his fingers to refrain from losing control, but there was no doubt now, not like the time she'd returned to him in tears, crying because of what he'd assumed were her mistakes when really it'd been everything they'd done to her as a result of her getting close to him. And as torn as he was, he'd truly lost his head in pursuing her, had allowed her to pursue him in a way he hadn't thought possible, he'd been warned, warned so many times and had sworn to himself to never make the same mistake and here he was, still doubting his rationality when it'd been what had kept him overwater for so long.

“Alexander” she whispered, another step forward and their faces almost touched, the way his hand shot up and wrapped around her neck as an automatic defense making her gasp as he momentarily trapped her breath before loosening his grip again. “What happened?”

“Yeh fookin' kno' wha' 'appened, Jade” he muttered through gritted teeth, nothing but darkness reflecting in his eyes. “The bloodeh deal fell through, people in San Marino are no longer on me side and I fink yeh kno' better than evrehbodeh why tha' is.”

“I-...” Her breath was once again restricted until her attempt to speak ceased and she waited for him to instead.

“Better than meh, dun't yeh, Jade? And dun't yeh dare try teh stall meh, teh lie teh meh. I dun't 'ave time for yehr fookin' games.”

“What do you mean they're no longer on your side?” She asked, got the words out before he silenced her with merely his gaze this time.

“Me patience is not endless. I kno' I've been soft on yeh but dun't yeh doubt me words...” His voice was shaking, he didn't believe his own words, but he knew he had to stick to them, or someone else would and there was no rational justification this time to prevent it. “If yeh 'ave aneh fookin' morals or value decenceh even in the slightest, if yeh kno' wha's good for yeh, yeh'll tell meh exactleh wha' possessed yeh teh tell Alfonso about me alliance in San Marino.”

She swallowed hard, her breath shaking. The words hung in the air, the words she'd been so afraid of and she caught her lip trembling, her own vision blurring with tears of fear, more so his than her own. “No” she whispered. “It's not what you think.”

A dark chuckle zapped her right back into reality, out of her thoughts and forcing her to deal with something that resembled a nightmare, yet was very much wake reality. “Never is, is it?” He asked. “Yeh're saying 's not true?” The amusement in his voice was laced with nothing but hurt and disappointment and she despised herself more so for igniting something inside him that she'd been trying to heal than she did for the next words she uttered.

“It is true.”

He exhaled sharply, the way she could watch his chest rise and fall visible as he closed his eyes for a moment. Even though he'd known what to expect, the way she admitted it herself crushed all his doubts and defenses, all the protection he'd subconsciously created for her inside his mind, yet did not make it easier to not fall into old patterns and give in to the way her familiar scent made him feel, it only made it harder.

As much as she'd been dreading this moment, she was not unprepared for it. In her mind, she had over and over again gone through the situation, the background, the possibilities, had come to the conclusion that she'd made the only possible decision she herself would be able to live with, had luckily been taken out of the situation before being forced to make decisions that would have gotten increasingly harder, and she wondered if only she'd held out for a little longer than maybe she could have prevented her own actions, but she also wouldn't have given anything to stall them. It was the way she'd come to peace with her decision that allowed her to look back at him with a confidence she wouldn't have otherwise been able to muster, calm and collected in a way he could only compare to himself.

“Why?” He asked, the tone behind his voice almost desperate before he cleared his throat and composed himself. “Wha' fookin' possessed yeh teh do this?” It had not been more than twenty minutes that he'd been trying to wrap his head around the news, Alfonso knowing about his alliances in San Marino and having strategically turned them against him, knowledge that could have only come from one source, a source that knew full well what her betrayal would do to him because as naive as he was aware of, he'd trust her, had finally allowed himself to trust her and not dwell on everything Adriana had caused him to lose, had accepted that the past was no equivalent on cautionary tale for the future, that Jade was not Adriana, that she would not have gone through so much with him, reassured him, saved him, made him better only to do the exact same thing but maybe that's what she'd been waiting for, a deeper level of trust that would ensure he'd lost his original doubts. Her every word that came back to his mind now was tainted by the ugly knowledge of what she'd done, had lost all meaning and left him angry and frustrated at himself more than her, cursing himself for defending her, for standing up for her against his own sister, his parents, prospects of a sheltered future and all his plans crumbling because Jade was not going to be there to help him through something she'd done to him and he felt like a fool for ever thinking he could be safe with anybody, for ever thinking she loved him, that she was different.

But he didn't need help now. He needed nothing from her except for answers, his voice louder than he'd intended when he spoke again, his fingers once again squeezing her neck slightly when she didn't respond. “I fookin' asked yeh summat” he said, irritated by the self-assured look in her eyes. At least when he'd saved her from Alfonso she'd been desperate to win back his favour, now nothing suggested that she cared. “Did they threaten yeh? Did they offer yeh summat? Did they fookin' touch yeh?” The way she looked at him had his anger rising, furious that he despite it all wanted to reach out and hold her, tell her he trusted her and that there was no reason to be distressed, but he knew he couldn't, the fear of showing weakness now too prominent, the embarrassment sat too deep in his bones.

She swallowed. “Alexander” she whispered, the truth now everything she had to offer, but knew that with the way he saw her now, looked at her now, it was useless. “They threatened to kill you.”

His throat stretched over his adam's apple as he swallowed, took in the words her deep red lips formed, condemning the thoughts she evoked within him but he forced himself with all the strength he could muster to not allow her to fool him again, shaking his head slightly. He could not continue making the same mistake. “And I'm s'posed teh believe tha'?”

Her eyes widened. “Have I ever given you a reason not to?” She whispered.

“Yeh lied teh meh, Jade.” He remembered it only too well, the one time he'd made her cry in a way that did not involve pleasure, how he'd thought he would never want to see it again and would do anything he could to prevent it but here he was, instilling the very same fear within her he had then, resisting the temptation of soothing his frustration in taking the other hand the same way he had the very first time he'd bent her over the very desk behind him.

“I know” she said. “But I did it to protect you. I know the business should come first and that … it was weak, but I stand by my decision. I didn't tell you because I knew that you'd set something in motion, anything to secure your alliances that would have given away that I told you.”

“I'm not fookin' stupid, Jade.”

She shook her head, her gaze softening. “Of course not” she said, swallowing, pressing her lips together. “But I couldn't risk that with your life on the line.” She breathed out shakily, hesitantly lifting her hand cover his own around her neck in an attempt to not pull it away but squeeze it slightly. “Alexander, please...” she whispered, now pleading for something she knew was already lost. “Why would I want to hurt you?”

“'ow could yeh look meh in the eye?” He said, his jaw tense as he spoke, ached now to turn back time and wondered if he would have preferred to remain oblivious to go back to just that morning, admiring her just a moment before she'd woken up, her power and everything she stood for, the way she was so at peace with a dormant fire sleeping under the surface. Once again, his anger at himself prevailed. “Sleep in me bed? I fookin' saved yehr life, I fookin' … I gave yeh evrehfin'.”

“I was so afraid, Alexander, terrified that I couldn't warn you! I swear I just wanted to protect you.” There was nothing she could say now, could see in his eyes that it was different than last time, that he'd made up his mind. “What I told them … that I didn't tell you … I … I stand by that and I don't regret it. I did that because I love you.”

His heart skipped a beat, his poise momentarily faltering as he fought the urge to reciprocate her words. “Dun't yeh-...” He bit his lip, his eyes darkening. “Dun't yeh fookin' say tha' teh meh now.” He was afraid of losing control now in a way only she could cause, and he knew he needed a moment to make sense of it all, hated himself for being angry as well as worried about not only Miles encountering Adriana, but Jade as well, trying instead of focus on the evidence he needed to get through this, as much as he wanted to believe her, he knew she'd searched for action that night she'd gotten into that car, for excitement, undoubtedly would have gotten into one of Alfonso's and Mancini's cars instead had the opportunity presented itself, in a way, maybe she was not so different, would have used her intel on him against him just the same eventually. It was good he'd found her out sooner rather than later and as much as it hurt now, he knew it would have only gotten worse.

“Alexander...”

“No” he said, drawing his hand from her neck, yet silencing her once again with just a look of his eyes, their intensity making her shiver, making her desperate to reach out because she could only imagine the war raging in his mind, nothing compared to the altercation with Alfonso or any other rival. She'd once again made him feel betrayed, had for his own good played into his worst fear, sought now to desperately soothe him and convince him of the opposite, the truth that now would not get through to him. “Wha' else did yeh tell them?”

“N-Nothing” she whispered, his question instilling a shred of hope within her. “I swear on your life … and on my life, Alexander, you know everything now. It wasn't nice for me to keep it from you, to keep it from myself because I knew what it would cause, and I didn't want to hurt you, I just wanted to protect you.”

“Stop” he snapped. “Stop sayin' tha'.” He could sense himself losing control now, grateful for the interruption of his phone vibrating on his desk and stepping back to unlock the screen and glance at the message, his face expressionless when he looked back at Jade, lifted his hand slightly as he passed her only to clamp it into a fist again, his nails digging into his palm as he resisted the urge to touch her, kiss her before he left, the familiarity he loved so much fading violently.

She parted her lips to speak when he walked past her without a touch, a word, gasping, then pressing her lips together, her heart skipping a beat when he turned to look over his shoulder, his fingers fumbling to light himself a cigarette. “Yeh stay 'ere. This isn't over.”

She flinched when the door fell shut. She didn't try to follow him, knew that he had more work to do, knew that Helders was right outside. Slowly, she walked around the desk, trying to keep the noise of her heels to a minimum as she sat down in his chair, her stance slumping as she placed her arms on the rests to both her sides, closing her eyes.

Similarly to how she'd figured things out before, she tried desperately to think of a solution now, something to do that would leave him no choice but to believe her, but it was not going to be that easy. Last time, she'd had the benefit of the doubt, had been in so deep with him that he had blindly trusted her despite all odds and she was able to prove him that it'd been justified. Now that time acted entirely against her, weakened the trust that moment had once built up. The fear of her own fate was surpassed, overshadowed by the knowledge of how she'd made him feel, that she was no better than Adriana in his eyes.

While she'd earlier looked forward to sink into his arms at the end of the night, she now knew she was lucky if he'd ever even look at her again. As much as she knew that she was right, that she had made the right decision, everything within her understood why he felt betrayed, why he saw her in the light she hated to be seen in, why there was no chance even though the truth was on her side.

She sat motionless, time passing beyond her awareness until she suddenly heard a door slam in the distance, steps approaching and she tensed, rose to her feet, yet stayed behind the desk, reaching out and fumbling for her gun when it all fell silent again, distinct voices until the door was pushed open, hopeful to see Alexander, but instead, Helders stared right back at her, his face expressionless and he motioned for her to follow him. As fearful as she was, she knew she had no choice, her heart pounding as she obediently zipped up her bag, her heels clicking on the floor as she approached Helders, her eyes wide when he still refrained from speaking, instead closing the door behind her and leading her wordlessly down the corridor. In the distance, somewhere upstairs she could still hear loud steps, talking, hurried motion. “Where are we going?” She asked hopefully. Surely Alexander wouldn't act this quickly, wouldn't dismiss everything they'd had without another conversation, without proper questioning.

Helders remained unfazed, by the noises as well as her question, pushed open the door and led her outside, two more henchmen holding the doors of the car open in silence.

“Helders” she said, her voice rising slightly in volume and pitch, more demanding now. “Where are we going?”

“Turner's apartment.”

The obvious tone to his voice eased her momentarily, comforting to her somehow because she knew that he wasn't concerned with soothing her, he would've remained silent rather than lying and she swallowed, now hopeful Alexander was open to speak with her again, yet wondering if he'd told Helders on his way out already.

She sat in silence herself, knowing that even if they were taking her somewhere else, there was no fighting it without Alexander there personally, and once again, she preferred action to the wait she despised so much, yet could hardly contain herself even during the short wait of the car, fuelled as well as relieved as she followed Helders into the familiar building, her fingers fumbling absently with her stone on the way up in the lift.

She managed to stay composed when she really and truly stood in front of the apartment door, felt hopeful, like she still had a chance – until Helders opened the door for her and she was enveloped by darkness, a darkness and a stillness inside that suggested they were alone, telling herself for a moment that he probably just wanted her to wait, until she heard the door shut behind her and the lights flickered to switch on, Helders stood behind her in the room as she turned around, the look on his face not entirely expressionless this time, it expressed something she'd never seen.

“When is he coming back?” She asked, parted her lips again, yet shut them quickly when she saw the look he gave her.

“Jade” Helders said, pressing his lips together as if to prepare himself, hesitation strange in his demeanor. “They took 'im.”

For a moment, Jade thought she hadn't heard him right, had just heard the worst case scenario that her head had prepared, but the look on his face matched, he was calm and collected as always, but there was something else. “W-What?”

“On the way to 'is meetin'. One of our men didn't make it, two are recoverin'. Turner's gone.”

She breathed shakily, her heart thudding almost violently as if trying to burst out of her chest. Her fingers clenched to fists, her thoughts running wild, she could only think of one thing. “And why the fuck are you here?! You have to do something to get him out of there, Alfonso can't just do that!”

She was expecting him to have the answer, to shrug the way Alexander did in these situations, when he was already a million steps ahead, but his response was as much of a hit as the initial doom. “I'm under orders to keep you here and to keep you safe.”

As striking as it was that she realised now he probably didn't know what she'd done and how she had made Alexander feel, it infuriated her more that he stood here despite. “He doesn't trust me anymore” she stated. “It doesn't matter if I'm safe.”

Helders stood motionless. “I'm under orders.”

“If someone kidnaps your boss, surely getting him back is your first priority!”

He shook his head, had her cursing him for being so calm. “The boss has protocol for this.”

“You don't understand” she warned, her voice not reaching beyond a whisper, trembling. “There was a threat. They're going to kill him.”

When another moment passed without response, she fumbled for her weapon in desperation, undid the safety and held it pointing at Helders in front of her. Nothing mattered now, she just knew that something had to happen – no matter what it took. “Let me out of here if you won't do anything. I'll go myself.”

“Put the weapon down.”

She swallowed, her hand shaking, her lips trembling. “I won't hesitate.”

A deep sigh, one step and a simple maneuver and Helders held her gun in his hand, evoking a sense of defiance in her that had her pushing against him with her hands on his chest, all her force, yet she hardly swayed him, standing steadily on his feet and refusing to let her pass to reach the door. “I dun't want teh 'urt yeh, Jade.”

“I fucking dare you.”

Her attempts remained fruitless, none of her hits impacting him in the slightest, ones that posed more fatality he knew to counter until he held on firmly to both her wrists, turning her arms to her back as she trashed around despite her exhaustion, his knee lifting to meet her heel and protect himself when she pulled up her leg, her struggle finally ceasing, her breathing heavy.

“Jade.” He sighed, holding on to her for a few moments more. “There's nothin' teh be done now.”

#napule nights #alex turner #alex turner fic #alex turner fanfic #alex turner fanfiction #alex/jade #alex turner/oc #adt #chaptered fic #writing #mafia!al #mafia au #nn #The Last Shadow Puppets #miles kane #arctic monkeys

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heroesarelife · 6 years

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Pleasure to meet you, Amethyst! I'm sorry for making my first request very angst-y. Aizawa, Hizashi, and All Might (separate btw) have a terrible nightmare that their s/o was brutally killed in front of them. As they jolt awake and try to calm down (it seemed so real oh god oh GOD) they look to their side and find their s/o snuggled up and sleeping peacefully beside them, safe and sound.

Oh, nice to meet you nonnie ;D and no worries at all! I sort of live for angst, but don’t tell on me, aye? xD I legit liked working on this one and I hope you enjoy as well, I love these pro-heroes so much

Warning: Can be a bit gory.

Aizawa Shouta (Eraserhead)

Aizawa has a complicated relationship with sleeping, to put it kindly. It never came that easily for him, and when it did it could often be restless. And his dreams could be plagued and dreadful, more often than not making him feel that more tired after waking up, no matter how many hours he had slept. So he tires himself to death’s door because then the odds of his dreams reaching him become slimmer. However, it does not always work, and this is one of those nights.

He falls into the nightmare immediately and intensely. He knows something is wrong, something is very much wrong. Worry takes over him, bone-deep. He can hear the maniac laughter and his trained prepared to fight, hand grabbing for his weapon. But there’s nothing there. He’s unarmed.

Mind in a frenzy, heart pounding madly, he tries to think. But he can’t grab hold of a single thought, as if they were immaterial and made of pure noise and chaos. And yet he was sure, deep in his gut, that someone needed saving; he needs to do something. Anything.

All of a sudden he crashes hard against the ground, heavy weights pressing his back, immobilizing him. Air abandons his lungs altogether and pain takes his senses by storm, gagging in his own blood. Aizawa tries to to fight back, desperate, but his body fails him. All his limbs feel as though made of lead, trapping him to the hard cold ground. He’s weak.

He realizes then that he can’t see. Everything is covered in darkness, like a thick fog surrounding him, depriving him of his only proud possession, his only weapon. Screams fill the air, a voice pleading and begging for mercy. For help. His help. He recognizes his s/o voice and panic settles in his soul, ice-cold and unbearable.

Aizawa hears the mocking laugh behind him and the scream is so close, so painfully close. His body is traitor and disobeys him, the weight heavier by the second. And he doesn’t his eyes because he can hear, as if watching from the first row. The sick snapping of bones, the distinctive gushing sound of spilled blood. The fainting anguished screams that pierce his heart, destroying him.

He wakes up then, eyes opening with a startle. His whole body rigid, muscles strained with effort in a silent fight. Nausea overcomes him and he sits up slowly, breathing with effort. Dread covers him like needles; he had lost them. He was weak, and it was his fault. He knows it now to have been a dream, he knows because he can feel the warm touch of their hand in side, anchoring him to the moment. Trembling ever-so-slightly, he runs his hand through his hair. It felt real.

He will eventually will himself into being calmer. In fact most of his distress will manifest itself very inwardly and not show physically, much. His heart will be beating faster than normal, his body not as steady as he would wish it was, making him all too aware of his structure and bones.

Once his breathing is more or less normalized he will lay down again, comforted by his s/o’s steady breathing, by their warmth. He will wrap himself around them, pulling them against him carefully as to not wake them. He won’t fall asleep again, instead choosing to run his hands through their body and skin, allowing the feel of him to bring him back to reality and function as a balm to his spirit.

Yagi Toshinori (All Might)

Normally a light sleeper, Toshinori also barely moves in his slumber. The memories of his old life - his old body - still deeply ingrained in his habits and behaviour. So despite not occupying the same room as before and not being accidentally rough or strong, he will still sleep in a very still manner. His ears pricked, ready to jump into action even as his quirk and power abandons him by the minute.

So he floats, his dream is unreal and abstract, disappearing in itself before he can make any sense of it. Which is alright, it’s not like he’s trying. It’s mindless and pleasant, like being in a warm cloud, abstracted from all thoughts and worries.

He’s grabbed then, suddenly. Infinite hands holding his body, dragging him towards darkness. He still can’t make sense of things, but now it brought only anxiety and despair. What’s going on? What is it? He’s surrounded. Instinct kicks in and he deals the only way he knows how - the way he learned would always solve the situation. He punched.

Nothing happens, shadows only attached to him with suffocating pressure. Dissolving under his fists and binding him as if they were chains. They lamented, cried for help. It filled his ears and heart, because he understood to be haunted, recognizing his ghosts. He needed to be able to save them, he should be able to. But he couldn’t, he couldn’t save everyone and yet they called for him, for All Might.

Desperate he fought the hands, the pressure of the shadows, because now he could hear his s/o’s voice. The agonized scream bringing dread to his heart, and suddenly he couldn’t move. Released, he falls to the ground, no longer All Might. Now only the Yagi Toshinori in his fragile, skinny, useless body. He could only watch as the vengeful ghosts took over the person he loved the most, imprisoning them with death grips. Filling their lungs with darkness. They looked at him, wide eyes streaming with desperate tears, pleading for the help he could no longer provide. Dying for him, for his mistakes. And he could only watch, paralyzed, heartbroken. Useless.

That’s when he jerks awake, sitting up as if he was punched in the gut, almost falling off the bed in the process. He goes into a coughing fit, struggling for air. He’s all stiff muscle and cramped tendons, pain overcoming his own being when sorrow hits him like a truck. Eyes wet, blood dripping down his chin, he looks up.

His s/o is sleeping in bed, their chest rising and falling reassuringly. He battles down the cough threatening to spill more blood in the sheets and tries to calm down. They are alright, his ghosts were his weight to bear. And only his. And they were alright, it’s all that mattered.

Moving sparingly as to not wake them, he settles down again, joints cracking with the effort. Heart heavy and yet relieved, he carefully wraps their hand with his, needing a point of contact. And wills himself back to sleep, this time keeping the past at bay.

Yamada Hizashi (Present Mic)

Yamada is the sort to be having a nice dream about him and his s/o, maybe traveling and on a nice date. So he smiles in his sleep, may even laugh as he does so. Letting out a quiet laugh, the kind he wouldn’t do while awake; his tones are all surprisingly softer when he’s in sandman’s embrace.

Then his dream will slowly and discreetly shift towards a darker setting. Somehow his nice trip takes a twist and he finds himself in a bad situation, fighting a bunch of very violent villains. He asks his s/o to hide - or he must have, he surely must, that’s procedure so how could he forget? - but Yamada must have somehow forgotten because he turns and one of them have his s/o in a firm chokehold.

His heart goes to his throat, in ways that a battle would never usually make him feel. The distraction works and next thing he kens he’s on the ground, head pressed hard against the concrete, blood filling his mouth when he accidentally bites his tongue on impact.

For once, he can’t scream, he can’t. Because his s/o is doing that for him, the terrorized sound deafening him with absolute despair. He fights against the weight on top of him, and a hand pushes him harder against the floor, mercilessly scratching his skin raw. He can’t move, he can’t get away, he can’t. All he can do is watch in horror as their screams disappear into nothing more than dry whimpers, strength leaving their body faster than their blood paints the sidewalk.

That’s when he wakes up, startled and with a scream lodged in his throat. But he does not release it, he can’t; it chokes him. The panic’s still settled deep in his bones, too overwhelming and real for him to let out more than a whimper. He couldn’t save them. He had an all around powerful quirk, was a renowned hero, and yet…

Relief takes him over with a bang. His s/o is beside him, safe and sound. Yamada can even hear the sudden rush of blood in his eardrums, as time comes back into motion and blood runs back to his paled features. God, he had been so scared.

Au his state of mind, even the usually annoying snoring of his s/o gives him the giggles, and he covers his mouth with a shaking hand to suppress it. He hasn’t recovered from the intense emotions and doesn’t wish to wake his s/o up to find him in that state.

He does need some comfort, however. So in the morning, his s/o will wake up to find him buried in their embrace, though they don’t recall sleeping in that position. Yamada’s face is against their neck, facial hair tickling their skin slightly. They think him asleep but he couldn’t go back to it, preferring instead to just be close and assure himself that they were indeed alive and well. In the position, they are able to kiss his forehead softly, still half asleep and pleased to have him so close.

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psychedelictrashpanda · 3 years

Text

It’s been awhile, weird old blog with unspecified direction. How about more of me me me?

I finally did DMT again, and WOW. It’s been at least a full decade since the last time. I still didn’t quite “break through” enough to “meet the entities” again but mein GOTT was it healing. Speaking of God, we’ll get to that soon... But before smoking the dimitri, I was beginning to sustain a mania in slow motion with dissociatives again. Not to any extreme like I did with PCP long ago (btw, glancing at my Eyehategod poster, I realize that horror/metal fest when I was blasted on PCP the entire time was all the way back in 2013! It seems to much more recent, but the way these drugs interact with memory is very peculiar. or maybe it was the traumatizing effect of it and other things at the time that makes me block out and thus distort the time signature of the memory... I digress). And I don’t have the destructive tendencies I did in the past anyway, so I’ve never been apt to push it as far as I was when I was shooting up 3-meo-pcp and blacking out for days at a time. I mean, I did push it I suppose. For the main George Floyd protests I was loading up on a combination of things. Can’t even remember if that was my sober window between methadone detox and the suboxone I’m on now. But, I was combining bits of weird PCP offshoots with opiate offshoots (4-map iirc) and/or kratom with maybe a drop of benzo... straddling the line between going overboard and a “party dose” for lack of a better descriptor; between recreation and desperation. In retrospect, I was summoning the courage to act like my old self used to in these sorts of situations. That is, giving it my all, being novel about it, idk, summoning the spirit of Dr Gonzo I suppose (who, after reading his two books, was more slimey of a jerk than he’s presented in Hunter’s stories. well, I need to finish the Cockroach People book, he started getting into his attraction to underage girls as a young 20-something man himself and ugh, gross). My true wild & adventurous spirit has been hampered, weighed down with anxiety and depression and all manner of undiagnosed mental illness. Who knows if it’s more the drugs or the environmental factors that trigger drug use, but the spirit is tortured like Griffith in the torture dungeon, the heart is wrapped in a black grime guarded by the Beast of Darkness, the will is subordinated to authoritarian capitalist hegemony...

Where was I? Oh so I started suboxone for the second time in my life innnn... February I want to say. Last time I did it I was able to detox myself simply buying subs off the street, but I did it too quick. That’s been one problem, every time I detox rapidly it’s too harsh a push back into reality and I succumb to relapse less then a year into sobriety. The reason reality is harsh is the same reason my stance on anti depressants has been further cemented. I’ve articulated it better lately... Basically I believe it’s a weird solution to depression to force your chemical makeup into the right position to function properly in the same environment that caused it in the first place. “It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.” One of my conversations with a young college friend really illuminated why many don’t even consider this position. She was insistent there’s no cause of depression, you’re just born with a fucked up mind. Now sure, hereditary disposition is a thing, as a drug addicted child of an addict I should know. But for example she pointed to another friend with hard depression and was like “his life seems fine what explanation could there be?” But I put forth maybe his childhood of having to closet his homosexuality in a hard conservative family that had the possibility of disowning him if they knew about it contributed to that “natural chemical imbalance,” as it’s implied. YES, some people NEED it. But for the most part, it really seems to me to be what I’m gonna call the thyroid phenomenon. That is to say, a medical explanation for a small fraction of severely affected patients is used as a broad brush by the public to diagnose themselves. Forewarning: I am not fat shaming here, forgive the example. Dietary practices are a personal thing so my feelings are stronger as well. Anyway, it seems to me as soon as this thyroid malfunction became a hard biological explanation for obesity beyond the psychological, suddenly everyone was a candidate. It’s fine to think “maybe I have it” but when a growing and significant portion of the obese crowd started screaming they all had thyroid problems and can’t help themselves, when a teensy percentage actually do... well it sort of touches on the “addiction as a disease” narrative that’s never sat well with me. Addicts use the disease reasoning to skirt personal responsibility. I'm not denying it is a disease, but I believe calling it as such in the public discourse isn’t terribly constructive. (Okay, you’re seeing an opinion change in real time here... I changed my mind.) I was vehemently against the narrative, but I need to readjust to simply make people WARY of the narrative. As an addict, I could easily see myself using the excuse of it being a disease as a fatalist function; that is to say giving in, relinquishing personal control over my fate. Hereditary disposition, Rat Park, addiction as a disease... there’s also a severe lack of control it all conjures. Paradoxically, drugs can used to meticulously control your state of mind. I can’t control my desire to control myself?

God where was I going with this... Oh! God! May as well mention I’ve been warming up more and more to the spirit of monotheism beyond it’s structural and institutional dimensions. I could get deep into my recent past of not believing in the idea of a spirit, soul, etc. How the pendulum of my ideology swings between cold rationalism and loose spirituality, especially as I go through phases of rebellion against perceived oppressors. Growing up in a red state with a lot of Christian ideals, society around me was always telling me everything I seemed to like was the work of Satan. Naturally, I started reading into Satanism. I never self identified with occult-esque belief structures, except maybe chaos magick because it’s whole idea is to merge whatever practices work into something of your own, but I did staunchly identify as anti christian. Not a hard thing to do when you’re already a metal head, which definitely fueled the trajectory. Not to mention metal helped goad me into DXM use (thanks Velvet Cacoon ya bunch of goons), the first real psychedelic journeys I had. Because I never gave real consideration to myself having depression, I moulded my personal ideology around the symptoms it causes. Which is why for awhile after coming to terms with depression as a problem I probably have, I was only able to identify it in retrospect. I never felt it in real time because it was so old-coat to me, I adapted to it like an addict adapts to their drug of choice and ti becomes their world. So I would decide to skip social events, let my room get messy, watch only old comfort shows, etc... but only AFTER emerging from that state was I able to immediately look back and think “wait... I was doing all those things because I was depressed.” In the moment, it’s rationalized as “I don’t want to see these people for these reasons” or “I want to watch spongebob because it’s fun and an old favorite.” Rationalization, the concept of the west, serves as a detriment to the individual in a number of manners. This is one. I was a MASTER at rationalizing away my drug use. Statistically, more people die from this this and that, why be worried that I’m on this drug instead? Statistics quelled the perceived danger. It was also a formative tool in my skills of justification. I always felt I had to justify every action I took, but that’s getting back into family matters...

But why not bring that up? it’s a sore spot. I feel like the tables have flipped from my dad always saying “you all just think I’m an asshole!” to me thinking I’m the asshole. It’s too much to get into but I’ll touch on a couple important things... I’ve learned a major source of my anxiety is not being able to draw the boundaries between business and family and myself, because they’re not properly defined. When I’m told by my bossfather after explaining the distress I feel simply thinking about the family company, and he goes typically all-or-nothing when I touch on crucial issue and says “if you want out just tell me you want out”, I can’t separate between whether he’s saying it as a father or as a boss in the moment. He would say, “of course I just mean the company”, but where does company end and family begin? It’s also an intense pressure, maybe shame, simply typing this and thinking in the back of my head about someone who might read and think “what a spoiled brat, has a family company and blah blah.” But who put all that in my head? He says he’s changed from the days of putting immense pressure on me with the sort of sentiments that cause that shit in my head like always telling me how great I have it and all the opportunities, shit, I’m feeling it right now, the frustration and I can’t even identify these emotions. At least I am aware of them, that’s a huge milestone for me. But the only thing that’s changed is he sees me as a the broken mother fucker I am and treats me as such. Sometimes it’s nice, and sincere sympathy, other times his frustration with having to check his language all the time is palpable so it does no good to do so. The immense pressure, the intense urgency, the confusing complexity, all those market pressures haven’t changed. This is evident when we were driving somewhere and I suggested not worrying about the fastest route on the map because one minute isn’t a big deal and he insisted that one minute IS a big deal. Sweating one fucking minute indicates a mountain of reputational pressure. In a way, that one minute is putting business ahead of family, but I feel harsh saying it because as he’s pounded into my head the business is what allows the family to survive. Not to mention why put the crack head of the family above that one minute (not literal crack, but it was obvious as soon as he saw I was “fucking around” on ketamine he decided to not take me as seriously) Still, I’ve made my decision that survival reasoning is fucking bullshit already. He’s the one that wants a mansion and wants enough mailbox money for us not to have to worry ever again, so he’s the one deliberately creating the pressure. Maybe he hasn’t considered how hardened he’s become to those feelings after a lifetime in the street and in prison. I really feel for mom. She’s okay now, but her spirit... It’s part of the reason I can’t relax myself at home. He has always painted her as dead weight in the past, never getting a job, sitting watching TV, but he’s unable to connect the dots psychologically because we’re all layman that part of the reason she’s like that is because her actions have been demonized already so who the fuck she got to prove herself to? Same reason I fell into relapse sometimes. Damned if I do, damned if I don’t sort of deal. The damned if I don’t being the reputation of yourself you have to live with after getting sober. He says “don’t worry about it” but I couldn’t accept that because the reason he doesn’t trust me (never mind respect, that’s even further away) is informed by my past. I can’t complain that he never allowed me to contribute to a crucial decision like choosing the building for the dispensary, talking about whether we want a certain investor or not, etc, is because that’s not something to entrust to a druggie. I’ve always felt he let me play make-believe CEO and gave me an allowance for it, while telling me otherwise. He’d say “this is all for you” but he’s making the decisions that truly move mountains and then putting it on us. Which is why I have a hard time saying “I want out”, he can be a baby about things just as much as I am, and I fear he’d let his entrepreneurial drive be affected by my departure. Sigh, this is already getting to be a headache to think about... He’s tired. I’m tired.

There was also something I wanted to say regarding the role social constructs play in all this, but it’s getting long enough already. Suffice to say I’ve been getting into psychoanalysis lately and it’s scratching the right itch for knowledge and wisdom. I can see why Zizek is enamored with Lacan, and why it’s so important to mix it with Marxism. And not to toot my own horn, but what the hell... There are a lot of lofty ideas I’ve been coming across that are already parallel to ideas I’ve developed through my own life experience, and it makes me think I’m meant for this sort of stuff. If I’m lucky in my pursuits (not to put too much weight on the luck aspect), I’ll be a journalist of some sort. Articles, video essays, whatever. Need to rein in my indecisiveness and dispel FOMO tho.

Back to DMT. But not really. Earlier in the summer I got some straight Ketamine and it was also immensely healing. But it has a great abuse potential, especially for me, so it’s harder to “hang up the phone” after I get the message as TmK would say. It made me feel again, and start to understand what love is. Partly because it conjured all these lost feels I had for Kat. She’s great people though, I think I’d just stress her out too much. Idk. Whatever. My love life is a total mess. Anyway after I ran out I wanted more of course and stumbled on some DCK, a somewhat rare ketamine offshoot. Coupled with my increasing propensity to trip acid more than once a week, they started building on each other. I was happier and happier at home, but at work/fam was getting more and more distressed about my place in that whole show. In his show. Simply thinking about the company, especially after having read that article about procrastination and how much it resonated with me, caused me unnecessary levels of distress. Normally as quickly as I can feel that, my mind will tuck it away and bottle it up somewhere so I can go about my day. The problem with drugs is they cause you to act instead. So he was doing the usual “it’s so easy! you’ll have it made!” and I interrupted with this torrent of shit I’ve been holding back forever, and he would not yield on his “you didn’t let me finish...” Incidentally, has he really never picked up on every time I interrupt I already know what he’s talking about? I said as much, something like “it’s not the labor” and he keeps saying “no you’re not listening” as though a frivolous detail changed the main thrust of the fact he’s always trying to make it easier for me. I wish he could simply let me go off and have the strength to take it a little less seriously, but considering how often I take things personally I shouldn’t be surprised he does to. On top of this, his brother/my uncle was in the hospital for some serious shit. But another reason I picked this time is because I only feel safe even confronting him when non-involved parties are around. He doesn’t care that I don’t feel safe confronting him though, he says “don’t worry about me” so maybe I shouldn’t. I feel like such an asshole about it, but that feeling is conjured by the ideological structure he helped to create. Where does my shame end with him being the causation and start with my personal ideology? How much can a person create their own ideology, truly? It’s about as small a window as free will, I imagine.

SO after feeling awful for going off after having all this stuff build up in my mind, I felt awful and went home to drug up some more. Again, not recklessly to the extent I used to be. But I did a fat line of DCK while on a couple hits of LSD and a smidgen of Zolpidem (a wholly underrated substance). Everything was getting to me all at once. A perfect storm of my problems. All the while another doubt caused by ideology from without (society and family both) was making me think it’s all the drugs. But the developments I’ve made are huge strides, I’ve matured so much from it all. And I realized every time I do this, those developments are wiped clean because the validity of them is rendered null due to both the general social stigma of drugs and my history with them. And maybe that’s a major trigger fo rmy relapse in the past. I’m not suppose to be on drugs, but I dabble, have incredible experiences and make strides of maturity, but because it’s drugs the exact opposite effect is percieved from the outside; the experiences are simple chemical euphoria, the strides of maturity are false delusions. It triggers a sharp roll back down hill. I wish someone respected me for who I am, I feel so alone sometimes.

Drugs as an umbrella term, drugs as a vice for the worst dregs of society. There are so many problems in our world regarding drugs. I could write a book. But how much I’ve written here touches on another pressure I feel. IS it simply him again? When he asks “you’re gonna be gone in a few days right?” is that what’s making me feel like this is a waste of time? I’ve got to get out of here. It’s so hard though. I simply have to be strong. The strength is in me to take the massive cut to pay and benefits when I move. Maybe I’ll get a portion of my strugglers card back and shit heads like Blasey Shomas can’t simply say “why don’t you take care of yourself instead of daddy taking are of you?” anymore. Part of me wants to say he says that because he’s driven by his own emotions and not smart enough to directly debate my claims, his insults should hold no weight. Another part of me is truly trying to be... I don’t know a proper term for it without sounding egotistical, but “enlightened”? This is why monotheism is sounding more interesting to me. Jesus’ position about those dregs of society. I’ve always tried to be a trusting person, understanding of people’s struggles, the ideologies they function under that make them lash out or otherwise act the way they do, etc. I even changed my wording there from “I’ve always been” to “I’ve always tried to be.” Not so much for my usual reasons of dodging a committing claim (which I’m working on -- instead of “I think ___” just say what I believe to give the claim more sense of authority so as to be taken more seriously), but trying to be more humble. And not to think lowly and use myself as a punching bag like I used to... ugh, whatever. This post is messy enough.

So that night after having done DCK every day for a couple weeks and tripping every other night on acid, I was at my wits end on what to do, where to go next, everything. The outside world is crumbling, the inside world is lost. I finally whipped out that DMT I’ve had for a long while, something inside told me it was time. Oh duh it was the wits end part, I had no other chemical recourse. I sat in my bed with a foil sculpture loosely resembling a pipe, repeated to myself “it’s okay, just let it happen to you, it will be okay.” A part of me even had a small fear based on those rare reports of those interdimensional beings mentally raping some people, but I don’t know what to make of those experiences, seem like flukes. I took my three deep hits and set the pipe aside as soon as the rusb began and laid back. It wasn’t enough to break through, so I need to get a proper pipe, but it was enough for a “being” (which I am convinced is a part of your mind, not from another dimension or otherwise external source) to appear before me. At least I think. Whatever it was slowly came closer, reassuring me that I’d be okay. The most profound part was an overwhelming sense of all these puzzle pieces suddenly falling perfectly into place where they should be. As though the answers to all my struggles obvious and within me the whole time. For example as soon as I came back I adjusted my posture, as that’s something that I’ve been wanting to work on, and because I was reminded of that just now I adjusted my posture in my seat while writing this. I felt an overwhelming sense of forgiveness toward myself, I think. Amazingly, the inebriation I felt before the trip was largely dissolved, as though the stuff I was on somehow all lost it’s potency. The distresses melted away. At least, the power behind them was nulled. I’m still facing the same problems, but there’s a zen(?) quality to my thinking when they come up in my mind. No longer will a pin drop trigger everything I’m feeling all at once. When I came-to completely, I started BAWLING. In being overwhelmingly consoled by the trip, I became inconsolable. Tears of joy. Tears of healing. And that was the main takeaway. The loudest words of the experience were “Now the healing can truly begin.” At the same time, now the real work also begins.

Balance is key

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